802.11a PHY Matlab™ Model

802.11a PHY Matlab™ Model is a floating-point implementation of IEEE Standard 802.11a 1999 Edition in Matlab™. The IEEE 802.11a specification specifies the Physical Layer Entity for an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) system and the additions that have to be made to the base standard to accommodate the OFDM PHY.

The Wireless LAN system is initially aimed for the 5GHz U-NII bands. The OFDM system provides a wireless LAN with data payload communication capabilities of 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48 and 54 Mbps. The support of transmitting and receiving at data rates of 6, 12 and 24 Mbps is mandatory. The system uses 52 subcarriers that are modulated using Binary or Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (BPSK/QPSK), 16-Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (16-QAM) or 64-Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (64-QAM). Forward error correction coding (convolutional coding) is used with a coding rate of 1/2, 2/3 or 3/4.

Technical Specification

• Supports all data rates and modulation schemes: 6, 9, 12, 18, 24, 36, 48 and 54 Mbps (BPSK/QPSK/16-QAM/64-QAM)
• Framed (using 802.11a framing) and Unframed (OFDM only) Modes
• FEC implementation with rate 1/2, 2/3 or 3/4 and Fast Viterbi Decoder implementation as Matlab™ C-Mex code
• Support for both Hard / Soft Viterbi Decoder
• Exhaustive set of channel models: AWGN, 802.11 exponential channel, HiPERLAN/2 A, B, C, D, E channels, JTC, and user defined Rayleigh and Rician fading channels with Doppler effects
• Transmit and Receive Filters
• Time Domain Windowing Support
• Channel Estimation and Improved Frequency Domain Equalization
• Support for all synchronization non-idealities estimation and correction: Symbol boundary detection, Carrier frequency offset (with coarse and fine correction), Sampling clock frequency offset, Pilot-based phase correction and Timing jitter
• Support for modeling several RF/Analog Front End non-idealities: Power Amplifier non-linearity, I/Q Imbalance, Phase Noise, A/D and D/A quantization and dynamic range
• Peak-to-Average-Power (PAPR): model library of PAPR reduction schemes
• Support for analyzing system performance: BER, PER, PAPR, Transmitter Spectrum, Receiver Constellation, Channel / Synchronization / Front end impairments, and implementation loss
• Advanced Graphical User Interface including support for on-line performance plots (like PER Vs. SNR, PER Vs. Delay Spread, PAPR distribution etc), multiple simulations, and merging results from several simulations
• Several input data formats (text, image, audio/video) and internal random data and AWGN generation
• On-line help files
• High simulation throughput of over 5 Kbps and low memory requirements
• Full source availability

Applications

• IEEE 802.11a System Understanding
• IEEE 802.11a System Performance / Implementation Loss Analysis
• Custom Algorithm Implementation and Evaluation
• Basis for IEEE 802.11a System Realization

Platforms

• Available on Matlab™ 6.1 and GNU Octave 2.1
• For Fixed Point 802.11a PHY Matlab™ / C Model contact mkt@ittiam.com