EMRP-IND51: Metrology for Optical and RF Communication Systems

• Forschungsstelle: METAS
• Projektnummer: F-5218.30019
• Projekttitel Englisch: EMRP-IND51: Metrology for Optical and RF Communication Systems

Schlüsselwörter (Englisch)

LTE, traceability, power measurements, testing, fibre optics,
MIMO

Kurzbeschreibung (Englisch)

This project aims to support the R&D activities of industry by providing the underpinning metrology required by the wireless, optical and satellite communication parts of the network, covering all aspects from the network-edge to the network-core. This will enable instrument, component and satellite manufacturers to develop and implement new systems, minimising test and measurement costs and reducing the time to market for new products and services.
The aims are:

• Adaptive wireless systems that optimise the transmission channel are difficult to fully characterise. This project addresses three areas: (1) Measurement of radiated RF power and (2) Over-The-Air testing for 4G (and above) systems such as LTE and LTE-advanced where the transmitters and handsets have several antennas; and (3) Low-cost reconfigurable antennas are needed for many applications, including small satellites, but these are expensive
  to measure because each possible state must be measured. We will develop robust, traceable test methods in collaboration with test-equipment manufacturers to reduce this problem and reduce costs.
• Communication satellites are becoming more sophisticated and as a result, testing time and costs are increasing and becoming a serious problem. In this part ,the issue of measurement efficiency (time and accuracy) and verification will be addressed through four tasks: (1) Development of verified algorithms that balance measurement, modeling and interpolation to reduce test-time (2) Development of a nearly non-invasive electric field sensor to test small antennas at high frequencies (> 60 GHz). (3) Improvement the accuracy of the large testing facilities. The sensor developed in (2) will be used in this work. (4) Evaluation of the effect of environmental factors on measurement uncertainties - testing antennas under temperature stress.
• A faster optical core network needs to carry more data per channel. Alternatives are the network crunch (no capacity) or the huge cost of laying more fibre. During this project timeframe, new terminal and test equipment will be developed in industry to achieve up to 1 Tbit/s in a single channel. The supporting metrology for the transmitters and receivers will be developed.

This project is part of the European Metrology Research Programme (EMRP, http://www.euramet.org/index.php?id=emrp); it is partly funded by the European Union on the basis of Decision No 912/2009/EC.

Projektziele (Englisch)

METAS is mainly involved in workpackage no1: Terrestrial wireless communication. The specific objectives are:

• Develop Traceable RF power measurement for Over-the-air (OTA) Multiple In-Multiple-Out (MIMO) systems.
• Develop and verify a sound methodology that qualifies the measurement and associated uncertainties for OTA testing of MIMO and adaptive antenna systems.
• Develop accurate, efficient and cost-effective metrological solutions for smart, adaptive reconfigurable and wearable antennas. Establish with quantified uncertainties the rapid measurement of pattern, gain and efficiency in anechoic environments, and total radiated power/gain diversity in multi-path environments.

Abstract (Englisch)

Traceable measurements of mobile base-stations are important for protection against non-ionizing radiation. Within this project, a setup for measuring LTE signal has been realized and algorithms have been developed to determine the power of LTE reference signals in a way that the measurement is traceable to the International System of Units (SI). Experimental results have shown that the uncertainty of the LTE reference signal measurements is 0.05 dB (k=2). Moreover, the robustness of the power measurements has been demonstrated with a fading simulator.

Umsetzung und Anwendungen (Englisch)

This calibration capability is now available at METAS and the first certificates for calibration of LTE receivers have been issued. A best practice guide was developed and made available.

Publikationen / Ergebnisse (Englisch)

1. Soumya Dash et al., Traceable Power Measurement of LTE Signals, 17 International Congress of Metrology, 12005 (2015):12005:1:6
2. Soumya Dash et al., Approaching the Shannon Limit Through Constellation Modulation, Optical Fiber Communication Conference 2016 Anaheim, California United States, 20–22 March 2016, ISBN: 978-1-943580-07-1.
3. Soumya Dash et al., Receiver Algorithm for Decoding Constellation Modulation, OSA Technical Digest (online) (Optical Society of America, 2016), paper SpTu1F.3, presented at the "Signal Processing in Photonic Communications" conference in Vancouver.