Course Outline

Overview

This course will focus on the how signals are encoded for transmission and reception. The first part of the course will examine analogy communication systems such as AM and FM radio. The second part will concern digital communications, and how digital signals can be encoded and decoded over analog channels. Each week there will be a lab component that will involve capturing signals with an USB SDR, and decoding the signals in Matlab.

Outline

Section 1: Introduction and Background

• Overview of the different modulation schemes and mediums that are used for communcations

• Review of signals using 2 pi f transforms (as opposed to the omega transforms used in 102A)

• Finding your way around the RF spectrum

Section 2: Analog Communcations

• Amplitude modulation schemes, including commercial AM radio, SSB, and QAM

• Angle modulation schemes, such as commercial FM, as well as PM, PSK, and FSK

• Pulse modulation, such as PAM, PWM, and PPM

Section 3: Digital Communications

• Sampling, and the basis for digital communications

• Quantization, PCM, line coding, and reducing ISI

• Digital carrier modulation, including PAM, ASK, FSK, PSK, QPSK, and QAM

• SNR and system performance