Study on Channel Characteristic and Its

Performance for Wireless Communication

Employing Stratospheric Platform
Iskandar
Doctor Defense

Supervisor:
Prof. Shigeru Shimamoto
Graduate School of Global Information
and Telecommunication Studies

Waseda University

Outline

Research Background

Brief Introduction to Stratospheric Platform

Research Motivation

Main Research Content

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Conclusion

Future Work

Research Background

Compared to wired line, the demand in wireless mobile communication

has been increasing exponentially in the last decade because of
o
o

Nowadays, we have two well-established

information through wireless channel
o
o

method of

delivering

Terrestrial system
Satellite system

However, the fundamental problem of wireless communication is that

o
o

Users mobility
Flexibility

Multipath propagation problem

How to share the common transmission medium by as many users as
possible with a good quality of service

Researchers in communication community are now continuously solving

the problems:
o
o

Various new technologies (diversity, channel coding, advanced modulation,

MIMO, etc)
And at the same time they are looking for another alternative of wireless
delivery method
3

What is the Stratospheric Platform?

In ITU, the Stratospheric Platform (SPF) is called as a High Altitude

Platform Station (HAPS) which is defined as:

a station located on an object at an altitude of

20 to 50 km and at a specified, nominal, fixed
point relative to the earth

The definition does not mention if the object is piloted or unmanned or

how it is powered.

In WRC 2000, ITU has allocated spectrum:

o

Fixed communication

Mobile communication

28/31 GHz (mostly in Asia)

47/48 GHz (worldwide)
2 GHz

Position at the Atmosphere

50km

Stratopause

Stratosphere

20km

SPF

10km

Airplane
Troposphere

Tropopause

Cloud
Rain

0km
5

Comparison among the Systems

Terrestrial

Satellite

Stratospheric Platform

700 - 36.000 km
above the ground

20 km

Small coverage

Global coverage

Medium coverage

Low propagation delay

Large propagation delay

Low propagation delay

Low power requirement

Low power like in terrestrial

Huge numbers of base

station for global coverage

High power due to large

distance

Free-space-like channel with

Ricean fading

Rayleigh fading channel

Free-space-like channel
with Ricean fading

SPF Advantages

Advantages compared with terrestrial

o

Better propagation in many scenarios

Rapid deployment

Eliminate huge number of existing BTS

Large system capacity

Advantages compared with satellite

o

Close range good link budget and low delay

Lower cost (no launch vehicle)

Rapid and incremental system deployment

Larger overall system capacity

Environmentally friendly (no launch vehicle or rocket)

Major Projects and System Examples

Japanese SPF program NICT

Korean program KARI and ETRI

US program NASA, Aerovironment and Skytower

European program Helinet and Capanina

Japan

USA-Pathfinder

Korea

USA-HELIOS

USA-Lockheed

UK-StratSat

USA-HALO

ESA
8

Research Motivation

One of the first problems encountered in designing a novel wireless

communications system is that the channel characterization and the
propagation modeling need to be defined.

There are many researches have been done in channel

characterization and modeling for either terrestrial or satellite system.

In contrary, there has not been much reported for the case of SPF.

Therefore motivation in this study are:

o

Part 1
Try to evaluate the SPF channel characteristic in semi-urban
environment based on experiment.

Part 2
Evaluate propagation model in low-rises urban environment based
on ray-tracing simulation.

Part 3
Examine its performance and estimate the system capacity based on
the result of the proposed channel model.
9

Part 1
Channel characterization and performance
evaluation for wireless communication
employing stratospheric platform (SPF)

Objectives

Propose a definition and describe an analysis of wireless channel in SPF

communication in a wide range of elevation angles.

Investigate channel parameters such as Rice factor (K) and local mean
received power.

Describe channel performance based on the

parameters for a particular modulation scheme.

proposed

channel

11

How to Model the Wireless Channel?

Statistical model
o
o
o

Based on measurements
Specific for an intended communication system, spectrum allocation
or area
Less computational burden

Sitespecific or deterministic model

o
o
o
o
o

Based on theory of electromagnetic wave

Do not rely on measurements
Provide accurate prediction
Complicated mathematical operation
Time consuming

12

Methodology

Multipath power experiment

o
o
o
o

Data processing
o
o
o
o

LOS situation
1.2 and 2.4 GHz
Elevation angles from 100 to 900
Power level measurement

Row data is a power level apply to each elevation angle

Data conversion from power level to amplitude level
Generation of Cumulative Distribution Function (CDF)
Fading characterization

Channel modeling using best-fit test approach and channel performance

evaluation
o
o

Rice factor ( K )
BER performance

13

Experimental Setup
Stratospheric Platform

Balloon control

100

700

800

900

Remote carrier
control machine
14

Data Analysis

N samples of received instantaneous power over 900 elevation angle

were first collected

Pri90 = Pri

Then other data from other elevation angles ( = 800, 700, 600) are
normalized to RMS value of the data in 900.

PriFade =

Pri
Pri90

Compute cumulative probability by dividing range interval of the fade

data into NF power bins of the size F.

F N F = max {Fi }
Fi : Fade level

15

Measured Instantaneous Received Power

1.2 GHz

2.4 GHz

16

Statistical Property

The envelope statistics of received signal (R) can be described by Ricean

distribution in the presence of dominant line of sight component.

R 2 + A2 R A
p ( R) = 2 exp
I0 2 , R 0
2

average power of
multipath component

Modified Bessel function of

the first kind and zeroth
order

Amplitude of LOS
component

K factor is defined as the power ratio of the line of sight (LOS)

component to

the multipath rayleigh component.

A2
K =
2 2

large

small

Gaussian Normal
distributian

Rayleigh
distribution

Distribution of the
envelope Received
signal

17

Method of Moment (1)

The moments of original Rice distribution can be expressed

n
n

E[ R n ] = (2 2 ) n / 2 ( + 1) e K 1 F1 + 1;1; K
2

2
First and second moment and then can be expressed as
3
3

E[ R ] = 2 2 ( ) e K 1 F1 ;1; K
2
2

E[ R ] = 2 (2) e
2

A2 + 2 2
= 2 ( K + 1)
1 F1 (2 ; 1 ; K ) =
2

K factor can be obtained from ratio of the first and second

moment

E[ R]
2

E[ R ]

(3 / 2)

K
K
K
exp
(1 + K ) I 0 + K I 1
2
1+ K
2
2
18

Method of Moment (2)

1

0.96

E[R]/sqrt(E[R ])

0.98

0.94

0.92

0.9

0.88

10

20

30

40

50

K factor

(envelope statistic of received signal) was obtained from

measurement, so we can fit to the above curve to find measured K factor.
19

Rice factor (K)

25
Frequency 1.2 GHz
Frequency 2.4 GHz

1.2 GHz
0.94-18.60 dB

K factor [dB]

20

15

10

2.4 GHz

1.41-16.77 dB
0
10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

Elevation angle [deg]

From a measurement, K factor for SPF communication is in the range of

0 20 dB.
20

Local Mean Power

Elevation
angle

100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
900

1.2 GHz
K
Local
factor
mean
[dB] received
power
[dBm]
0.94
1.51
2.20
4.07
8.85
11.39
13.50
15.23
18.60

-88.59
-84.08
-84.38
-78.62
-74.85
-74.50
-74.03
-69.43
-67.31

2.4 GHz
K
Standard
Local
Standard
deviation factor mean
deviation
of local [dB] received
of local
mean
power
mean
received
[dBm]
received
power
power
[dB]
[dB]
5.15
1.41
-89.79
7.61
2.65
1.99
-84.80
6.96
1.75
2.33
-81.41
5.02
3.90
2.66
-78.22
5.06
1.46
4.61
-74.31
3.26
1.96
6.35
-73.52
2.91
2.75
9.21
-73.22
3.64
1.31
12.15 -72.28
1.59
0.47
16.77 -70.10
0.48

It is found that local mean power is an increasing function of elevation

angle.

Standard deviation of local mean power is a decreasing function of

elevation angle because the multipath power become smaller in high
elevation angle.
21

Performance Evaluation

Bit error probability evaluation is performed under the case of DPSK

and DQPSK modulation based on values of measured K factor.
DPSK :

DQPSK :

Pe , DPSK

K
(1 + K )

=
exp
2 ( + 1 + K )
+1+ K

Pe , DQPSK

1
(1 + K ) . e E
=
d +
2 0 1 + K + (2 2 cos )

Eb/N0

m=1

( 2 1) m

(1 + K ) . cos (m ) . e E
x
d
0 1 + K + ( 2 2 cos )
E=

(2 2 cos ) K
1 + K + (2 2 cos )

Numerical integration by trapezoidal method over 1 million sample was

carried out to obtain the bit error probability.
22

Performance under DPSK

Frequency 2.4 GHz

Frequency 1.2 GHz

10

Bit error probability, Pe

10
10
10
10
10
10
10

10

-1

10

-2

10

Bit error probability, Pe

10

-3

-4

K=0
10 [deg]
20 [deg]
30 [deg]
40 [deg]
50 [deg]
60 [deg]
70 [deg]
80 [deg]
90 [deg]

-5

-6

-7

10
10
10
10

-8

10

10

15

Eb/No [dB]

20

25

30

10

-1

-2

-3

-4

-5

K=0
10 [deg]
20 [deg]
30 [deg]
40 [deg]
50 [deg]
60 [deg]
70 [deg]
80 [deg]
90 [deg]

-6

-7

-8

10

15

20

25

30

Eb/No [dB]

23

Performance under DQPSK

Frequency 1.2 GHz

10

Bit error probability, Pe

10
10
10
10
10
10
10

10

-1

10

-2

10

Bit error probability, Pe

10

Frequency 2.4 GHz

-3

-4

K=0
10 [deg]
20 [deg]
30 [deg]
40 [deg]
50 [deg]
60 [deg]
70 [deg]
80 [deg]
90 [deg]

-5

-6

-7

10

10
10
10
10

-8

10

15

Eb/No [dB]

20

25

30

10

-1

-2

-3

-4

K=0
10 [deg]
20 [deg]
30 [deg]
40 [deg]
50 [deg]
60 [deg]
70 [deg]
80 [deg]
90 [deg]

-5

-6

-7

-8

10

15

20

25

30

Eb/No [dB]

24

Summary of Part 1

SPF channel has been characterized in semi-urban environment in the

condition of LOS.

In that condition, SPF channel has been found to be the Ricean fading
model due to the presence of LOS signal.

It is observed that channel parameters (i.e. K factor and local mean

power) are an increasing function of the elevation angle.

An analysis shows that elevation angle higher than 400 yields better
channel performance.

25

Part 2
Radio propagation evaluation using ray
tracing
algorithm
for
wireless
communication based on SPF.

Objective

Evaluate propagation model not only in LOS but also in NLOS

environment in the city low-rises urban environment.

Estimate power consumption that is required at the SPF in many

situations of different elevation and azimuth angles.

Describe the downlink channel performance of the SPF link for

delivering IMT-2000 services.

27

Methodology

Geographical data survey to find:

o
o

Building density and height distribution

Visibility

Based on the survey, we develop building block model as an area for

propagation evaluation.

Develop ray-tracing algorithm for various elevation and azimuth angles.

Apply ray-tracing scheme to the building block model.

Evaluate propagation parameters, power requirement and the downlink

channel performance.

28

Experimental Configuration
700

800

300

900

00

600
500
600

400
300
200

900

100
00

Top view

Side view

The car is equipped by fish-eye

lens
directions about 5 km in the city.

The target is
o
o
o

and

moves

in

various

Building density
Building height
Visibility
29

Building Block Model

=450

Top view
y

=600
70

35

8 buildings block model.

Three different azimuth:

900, 600, and 450.

Elevation angle varies

from 50 to 900 in a step
of 10.

The buildings in the

model are assumed to
have:

=900
55

D
25

35

70

o
o

85

SPF

Side view

wb

hb
ws

dm

x
o

height = 20 m
width = 25 m
vary in length
street width = 35 m and is
assumed to be equal in the
model
MS height = 1.5 m

ws
30

Ray Tracing Scheme

Ray
method.

Based on GO and
GTD.

launching

We
employ
9
categories of rays
involved
in
the
simulation.
Each ray undergoes
up to 4 bounces is
considered in the
simulation.
Rays outside the
above
category
will be terminated
from the simulation
environment.

multipath ray
direct ray

single
diffraction

diffraction
and reflection
single building
reflection

double building to
building reflection
single street
reflection

double building to
street reflection

31

Simulation parameters
1.

Platform height (h)

20 km

2.

MS height (hm)

1.5 m

3.

Building height (hb)

20 m

4.

Frequency

2 GHz

5.

Street width (ws)

35 m

6.

MS position (dm)

ws /2

7.

Azimuth angle ( )

900, 600, 450

8.

r Building

9.

r Street

15

10. Building

0.005 W-1m-1

11. Street

7 W-1m-1

10

32

Analytical Model (1)

Electric field of the ray arriving at the MS is calculated using the

following formulas, E0 is the transmit electric field at the transmitter
and k is wave number (2/).
e j k d
= E0
d

1. Direct ray

ELOS

2. Reflected ray

e j k ( s1 + s2 )
E R = E0 . R
s1 + s2
R =

3. Diffracted ray

ED =

sin( )

r cos 2 ( )

sin( ) +

r cos 2 ( )

E0
. D ( )
s3

s3
e j k ( s + s3 )
s ( s + s3 )

D ( ) =

1 1 + cos
2 k 2 sin

33

Analytical Model (2)

Respective rays for each ray category were added at the MS and
expressed as :

Ei =

j =1

Ej : electric field for jth ray

Ei : total electric field for ith categories of ray

The total electric field contribution consists of vector summation of M

ray categories and can be expressed by :

ETot =

i =1

Finally, the total path loss formulation is :

Etot
L = 20 log
4 E
0

34

Propagation Loss (1)

Azimuth 900

Azimuth 600

35

Propagation Loss (2)

Azimuth 450

Very good agreement between

ray tracing and Physical
statistical
model
for
the
scenario of azimuth 900.
In LOS, the result obtain by ray
tracing always about 3 dB lower
than that by Physical statistical
model for all scenarios.
Good agreement between two
model for NLOS situation
middle low elevation angle.
In NLOS very low elevation
angle (for azimuth 600 and
propagation
loss
450),
calculated by ray tracing is
smaller
than
that
calculated
by
Physical
statistical model.
36

IMT-2000 Specification

Required transmitted power at the SPF for IMT-2000 application is

calculated based on the following expression and specification.

Eb
PT Gt Gr
=
N0
Rb k T0 L( , ) L0 M L

Parameters
Frequency [Gz]
Information Rate [kbps]
SPF Antenna Gain [dBi]
MS Antenna Gain [dBi]
Blotzmanns constant [J/K]
Temperatures Chamber [K]
Link Margin [dB]
Cable, Connector, and Other Loss [dB]
Eb/N0 [dB]

Specification
2
8, 32, 64, 384, 2000
30
0
1.38 x 10-23
290
15.4
2
Max 7.9

37

Required Transmit Power (1)

Region 1

Average propagation path loss

[dB] versus elevation angle
Azimuth
[deg]
90
60
45

Elevation angle [deg]

Region 1 Region 2 Region 3
45 > 15 15 > 5
45
121.6
142.3
172.8
121.1
138.3
152.6
121.2
135.6
151.4

38

Required Transmit Power (2)

Region 2

Region 3

In region 1 (high elevation angle), the required transmit power by SPF is

almost similar for all scenarios. This means required power by SPF is not
sensitive to the azimuth angle.
However in Region 2 and 3, the required transmit power is a function of
azimuth.
The worst scenario is observed in Region 3 for 900 azimuth angle. Such high
power requirement may could not be implemented in SPF system.
39

Summary of Part 2

We have demonstrated the prediction of propagation loss in a low-rises

urban environment for mobile communication using SPF by means of
ray tracing algorithm.

The comparison with physical-statistical model has been performed for

verification and the result is in a good agreement in some cases.

Estimations of required transmitted power for IMT-2000 application

based on SPF have also been evaluated.

The results clearly show a critical limitations

communication IMT-2000 by using the concept of SPF.

of

mobile

40

Part 3
CDMA capacity analysis for multibeam
and multiple SPF communication

Objectives

Analyze the interference mechanism in a multibeam and multiple SPF

system.

Evaluate CDMA system based on the proposed channel model.

Describe analysis
imperfection.

Demonstrate the SPF system capacity.

under

fading,

shadowing

and

power

control

42

Methodology

Develop multibeam and multiple SPF model.

Perform an analysis of interference mechanism

Evaluate system capacity in terms of outage probability

43

Interference Mechanism in Terrestrial

I (d )

Interfering cell
Reference cell

Usually fourth power law of the distance is assumed in terrestrial

system due to multipath.

44

Interference Mechanism in SPF

Reference SPF
BS 1

Adjacent SPF

BS 2

I (d )

Reference cell

Interfering cell

Interfering cell

Because of LOS, square power law of the distance is assumed in SPF

system, higher interference would be produced.
45

Proposed Model
Single SPF model

Multiple SPF model

SPF

qij

lij

reference SPF

qij

qij

lij

overlapped region
between two SPFs

lijk

lijk

coverage
reference cell

qijk

user i(,j,k)

user i(,j)
reference cell

adjacent SPF

coverage of
reference SPF

coverage of
adjacent SPF

Overlapped region in multiple SPF model is a region outside the

coverage but still seen by the reference platform.
46

System capacity and Outage Probability

The transmission quality for CDMA system is describe in terms of Eb /N0

Eb
W C
=
N0
R I +
Interference
W
R
C

channel bandwidth

single user information bit

received carrier power

AWGN power

rate

Outage probability is defined as the probability of failing to achieve the

required (Eb /N0 )req

E
Eb
b

Pout = Pr

N 0 N 0 req
47

Reverse Link Interference Analysis

Even though power control must be employed in CDMA system because

all users are contending the same bandwidth at the same time.

However it is rather impractical to assume that there is perfect power

control.

Thus Eb/N0 can be expressed as

Eb W
P0 e i0 j0k0
=
N 0 R I int ra + I int er +
P0
d

nominal received power with ideal power control

zero mean Gaussian random variable to model power control

imperfection with standard deviation sd

Iintra
Iinter

Interference originated from users within the reference cell

Interference originated from users outside the reference cell

48

Intra Cell Interference

Interference from users within the reference cell is expressed as

I int ra =

N 1

P0 e

Imperfect power control

i =1

: voice activity factor

i : Gaussian random variable of the received power of the ith user

N : number of user per cell including the user of interest

49

Inter Cell Interference

Interference from users within the other cell is expressed as :

I int er =

P e
j =1 i =1

ij

+
2
ij

P
k = 2 j =1 i =1

2
ijk

ijk2

M : number of SPF
J : number of cell for each paltform

ijk2 : power discrimination due to spot beam antenna radiation pattern

ijk2 : power control factor for users in the overlapped region

ijk2 =

2
ijk

G j0 ( ij0 k )
G j ( ijk )

lijk

=
lij k
0

ijk
ijk

10 10

: boresight angle relative to the reference spotbeam

l ijk : distance from the users to their own serving platform

lijk : distance from the users to reference platform

ijk ijk : random variable modeling the shadowing effect

corresponding to these two paths
50

Outage Probability

Outage probability of reverse link can therefore be expressed as :

Pout

W
Eb
e i0 j0k0

= Pr

I
I

R
N
int ra
0 req

+ int er +

P0
P0
P0
I

I
= Pr int ra + int er
P0
P0

where

W
=
R

e i0 j0k0
1

(
E
/
N
)
E
/

b 0 req
b
0

Therefore

1
I
Pout = erfc
2 2
2
I

2
where I and I is the mean and variance of Gaussian distribution of (I /P0)

51

Simulation Parameters

Parameters
Channel bandwidth (W)
SPF height
Distance between SPF
Min. elevation angle
Voice activity factor ()
Eb/h0
Shadowing probability (A)
Power control error (PCE) for
unshadowed users (sus)
K factor

Value
5 MHz
20 km
200 km
100 and 200
3/8
20 dB
0.3
1 dB
0.9 18.6 dB

52

Capacity of Single Platform Model

Voice, R = 12.2 kbps (Eb/N0 )req= 5.0 dB

53

Capacity of Multiple Platform Model

Voice, R = 12.2 kbps (Eb/N0 )req = 5.0 dB

Compared with the result obtained for single SPF model, if perfect power control
can be achieved, the number of users supported at Pout = 10-2 would reduce by at
least 14% for speech services.
54

Summary of Part 3

It is found that because of the power control imperfection, the system

capacity in SPF CDMA system is significantly decreased.

In multiple SPF model, multiple access interference produced by the

users within an overlapped region is a nontrivial reduction of the
system capacity.

Therefore, the capacity reduction caused by these users has to be

compensated.

One solution is to increase the minimum elevation angle defined for

each platforms coverage.

For the model we consider in this work, with the setting of minimum
elevation angle is 200, the system capacity can be improved so as
nearly as the capacity brought by a
single SPF model.

55

Conclusion

We have evaluated channel characteristic and propagation model for

SPF communication both in semi-urban and in low-rises urban
environment.

In SPF communication, we found that Ricean fading channel is a proper

model for the SPF because of dominant LOS situation in many places in
the coverage.

K factor is observed to be between 0 and 20 dB depending on the

elevation and azimuth angle.

Propagation loss is found much lower than that in satellite system or

terrestrial system except for very low elevation angle such as below 100
in the area of low-rises urban environment.

SPF downlink channel performs better and sufficient to support IMT2000 services if elevation angle can be made higher than 400.

CDMA system capacity in the SPF communication is found to be a bit

higher than that in terrestrial system.
56

Future Work

Several issues that have not been considered in this study and therefore
need to be further investigated.
o

K factor in Part 1 is estimated using the method that ignores the

noise, however in real implementation it needs to include the noise in

estimating K factor.

Wideband channel modeling such as power delay profile in

stratospheric platform communication has not been investigated.

Inter-platform communication link.

Integrated network among terrestrial, satellite and stratospheric

platform.

57