Radiated transient interferences in digital communication systems

Resumen

In the Electromagnetic Compatibility research area, an unsolved interference problem is the measurement and evaluation of the distortion produced by radiated transient disturbances on digital communication systems. This impulsive noise, which is generated by switching devices or by sparks, is a broadband interference that covers the spectrum from DC to several hundreds of megahertz or some gigahertz. Additionally, this man-made noise is characterized by its short and random burst parameters, which make really challenging to measure it correctly. During the thesis, we have explained that impulsive noise is not properly measured and evaluated to prevent interference scenarios, when the EMC standard methodologies are applied. Detectors, such as the quasi-peak, frequency sweep measurements or signal-to-noise limiting evaluation described in the harmonized standards of the electromagnetic compatibility do not enable to determine beforehand the influence of transient interferences. Our strategy to overcome the non-profit measurement has been to perform novel measurement and evaluation techniques beyond EMC standards. The measurement technique developed joins the capabilities of EMI receivers and oscilloscope instrumentations to capture accurately the radiated transient interference. To carry out the measurement, the input stage of the EMI receiver is used for filtering and pre-amplifying purposes, conducting the IF output towards the oscilloscope, which is used for triggering and storage. Furthermore, a final post-processing stage is needed to obtain in time-domain the in-phase and quadrature components of the transient interference. Once the radiated transient interference has been measured properly, an accurate evaluation of the distortion produced to a digital communication system can be estimated. To evaluate the impact of the transient interference, a combination of the time-domain measurement with base-band simulation has been proposed to fulfil the thesis goal. The IQ time-domain measurement enables us to characterize the impulsive-noise present at the communication channel and determine the distortion produced to the digital communication system by means of base-band simulation. The procedure to determine the BER using the base-band simulation has been validated with experimental results, comparing the results reached with the developed methodology with the ones obtained when a communication system device is placed under radiated transient. Excellent results have been obtained employing the developed methodology, considering the interference produced by radiated transient to RFID or GSM communication systems Additionally, a new measurement methodology to obtain the amplitude probability diagram (APD) has been developed, offering the possibility to determine the bit-error-rate including limit lines at the APD diagram. This measurement method, based on captures obtained from a general purpose oscilloscope, makes it possible to obtain the APD measurement at any frequency band with the same accuracy provided by an EMI receiver. Furthermore, the post-processing tools using mathematical software produce the APD results rapidly at any bandwidth, and this makes it more powerful than employing an EMI receiver. The successful APD measurement system created is able to obtain the full-spectrum statistical measurement, employing several time-domain captures which can be acquired in practice immediately. In the final chapter of this thesis, the GSM system is interfered by radiated transients produced by sparks. The results provided by the APD diagram including the limit dots have been especially useful due to its fast capacity to interpret and quantify the degradation produced to the GSM system.