Unguided Media

After this lecture, you will be able to

– describe the physical and transmission characteristics of
various unguided media

B.1
 Unguided media
Guided to unguided
– Transmission
• the signal is guided to an antenna via a guided medium
• antenna radiates electromagnetic energy into the medium
– Reception
• antenna picks up electromagnetic waves from the
surrounding medium.
– Example
• a voice signal from a telephone network is guided via a
twisted pair to a base station of mobile telephone network
• the antennas of the base station radiates electromagnetic
energy into the air
• the antenna of the mobile phone handset picks up
electromagnetic waves
B.2
 Directional and Omnidirectional
Directional
– the transmitting antenna puts out a focused electromagnetic
beam
– the transmitting and receiving antennas must be aligned

– Example
• Satellite communication systems
• For a satellite located at 35784km above the ground, a 1°
beam covers 1962km2

B.3
 Directional and Omnidirectional
Omnidirectional
– the transmitted signal spreads out in all directions and can
be received by many antennas.
– In general, the higher the frequency of a signal, the more it
is possible to focus it into a directional beam

– Example
• mobile communication systems
• radio broadcasting

B.4
 Operating freqeuncies
Microwave
– Frequencies in the range of about 30 MHz to 40 GHz are
referred to as microwave frequencies

– 2 GHz to 40 GHz
• wavelength in air is 0.75cm to 15cm
¾wavelength = velocity / frequency
• highly directional beams are possible
• suitable for point-to-point transmission

– 30 MHz to 1 GHz
• suitable for omnidirectional applications

B.5
Operating freqeuncies

B.6
 Terrestrial Microwave
Physical description
– limited to line-of-sight transmission. This means that
microwaves must be transmitted in a straight line and that
no obstructions can exists, such as buildings or mountains,
between microwave stations.
– To avoid possible obstructions, microwave antennas often
are positioned on the tops of buildings, towers, or
mountains.

B.7
Terrestrial Microwave

B.8
 Terrestrial Microwave
– With no intervening obstacles, the maximum distance
between antennas is

d = 7.14 kh

• d is the distance between antennas in kilometers,

• h is the antenna height in meters
• k is an adjustment factor to account for the fact that
microwaves are bent or refracted with the curvature of
the earth
• k ~ 4/3

• Example
¾two antennas at a height of 100m may be as far as
82km apart
B.9
 Terrestrial Microwave
Applications
– Long-distance telecommunication service
• requires fewer amplifiers or repeaters than coaxial cable
• requires line-of-sight transmission
• Example
¾telephone system
¾TV distribution

– Short point-to-point links

• Data link between local area network
• closed-circuit TV
• bypass application

B.10
Terrestrial Microwave

B.11
Terrestrial Microwave

B.12
 Terrestrial Microwave
Transmission characteristics
– The higher the frequency used, the higher the potential
bandwidth and therefore the higher the potential data rate

Band (GHz) Bandwidth (MHz) Data rate (Mbps)

2 7 12
6 30 90
11 40 90
18 220 274

B.13
 Terrestrial Microwave
Attenuation
2
 4πd 
L = 10 log  dB
 λ 
• d is the distance
• λ is the wavelength

– attenuation varies as the square of the distance

• for twisted pair and coaxial cable, loss varies Why ?
logarithmically with distance
– repeaters or amplifiers may be placed farther apart for
microwave systems - 10 to 100 km is typical

B.14
 Terrestrial Microwave
– Attenuation increases with rainfall, especially above 10 GHz

Interference
– the assignment of frequency bands is strictly regulated
– OFTA (Office of telecommunications authority)
• www.ofta.gov.hk

B.15
 Satellite Microwave
Physical description
– a satellite is a microwave relay station
• link two or more ground-based microwave
transmitter/receivers (known as earth stations or ground
stations)

– The satellite receives transmissions

Whyon different
one frequency band
(uplink), amplifies or repeats the frequencies
signal, and transmits
are it on
another frequency (downlink). used?
• A orbiting satellite operate on a number of frequency
bands, called transponder channels

B.16
 Geostaionary Satellites
– It is launched into an orbit above the equator at 35786 km.
– This orbit distance means that the satellite is orbiting the
earth as fast as the earth is rotating.
• It appears to earth stations that the satellite is stationary,
thus making communications more reliable and
predictable.
• Earth stations is less expensive because they can use
fixed antennas.

B.17
Low earth orbit (LEO) and medium earth orbit (MEO)
satellites
– For small mobile personal communications terminals, a
network with significantly reduced transmission and
processing delay is required. Such a service could be
provided by low earth orbit (LEO) and medium earth orbit
(MEO) satellite systems.
• Delay is 250 -500ms for geostationary satellites

– These systems can provide direct personal-terminal-to-

personal-terminal connectivity.

B.18
 Applications
– Television distribution
• Direct broadcast satellite
¾video signals are transmitted directly to the home user

– long-distance telephone transmission

• point-to-point trunks between telephone exchange offices
in public telephone networks
• suffers from transmission delay

B.19
 Applications
– private business networks
• very small aperture terminal (VSAT) systems
¾ subscriber stations equipped with low cost VSAT
antennas share a satellite transmission capacity for
transmission to a hub station
¾the hub station can exchange messages with each of
the subscribers

B.20
Applications

B.21
 Satellite microwave
Frequency allocation
– Optimum frequency range for satellite transmission is 1 -
10GHz
• Below 1 GHz, there is significant noise from nature
sources
• About 10 GHz, the signal is severely attenuated by
atmosphere

B.22
 Satellite microwave
Fixed satellite service
Typical frequency bands for
uplink/downlink usual terminology
6/4 GHz C band
8/7 GHz X band
14/12 GHz Ku band
30/20 GHz Ka band

B.23
 Satellite microwave
Mobile satellite service
Typical frequency bands for
uplink/downlink usual terminology
1.6/1.5 GHz L band
30/20 GHz Ka band

Broadcasting satellite service

Typical frequency bands for
uplink/downlink usual terminology
12 GHz Ku band

B.24
 Broadcast Radio
Physical description
– omnidirectional

Applications
– AM broadcasting
• operating frequencies
¾MF (medium frequency): 300 kHz - 3 MHz
¾HF (high frequency): 3 MHz - 30 MHz

B.25
 Broadcast Radio
– HF is the most economic means of low information rate
transmission over long distances (e.g. > 300km)

– A HF wave emitted from an antenna is characterized by a

groundwave and a skywave components.
• The groundwave follows the surface of the earth and
can provide useful communication over salt water up to
1000km and over land for some 40km to 160km.
• The skywave transmission depends on ionospheric
refraction. Transmitted radio waves hitting the ionosphere
are bent or refracted. When they are bent sufficiently, the
waves are returned to earth at a distant location. Skywave
links can be from 160km to 12800km.

B.26
 Broadcast Radio

groundwave
B.27
 Broadcast Radio
Applications
– FM broadcasting
• operating frequencies
¾VHF (very high frequency): 30 MHz - 300 MHz

– TV broadcasting
• operating frequencies:
¾VHF
¾UHF (ultra high frequency): 300 MHz - 3000MHz

B.28
 Infrared
– Does not penetrate walls
• no security or interference problems

– no frequency allocation issue

• no licensing is required

B.29