Wireless

Communication
and Networks
Upena Dalal

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Chapter 2
Cellular Theory

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Key Topics
Why cellular technology
Cells, clusters, and cell splitting
Frequency reuse concept and reuse distance
calculation
Cellular system components
Antennas for base station
Operations of cellular systems and handof
Channel assignment fixed and dynamic
Cellular interferencesco-channel and adjacent
channel
Sectorization
Mobile traffic calculation
Spectrum efficiency of cellular systems
Location management
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Introduction
The concept of trunking (resource sharing)
between two central telephone exchanges was
used in conventional landline telephone systems.
A trunked radio system is a complex, centrally
controlled, full duplex radio system that allows
sharing of limited radio frequency (RF) channels
among a large group of users. It uses control or
signalling channels as well.

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 The concept of cellular technology encompasses

various aspects of infrastructure, for instance,
division of area, frequency management or
allocations, and call handling.
Following are the two major components of mobile
telecommunication system in general:
Central station-- This is common for many
subscribers and includes the switching
equipment and an RF transmitter and
receiver.
Mobile telephone-- Every subscriber must
have a mobile telephone that includes a
microphone, a speaker, dialling facility, a
radio transmitter, and a receiver.

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Cellular infrastructure
In modern cellular telephony, rural and urban
regions are divided into areas according to specific
provisioning guidelines or standard protocols.
Deployment parameters, such as amount of cell
splitting and cell sizes, are determined
experimentally in the cellular system architecture.
Provisioning for each region is planned according to
an engineering plan, which includes cells, clusters,
frequency reuse, and handovers.
Today, software tools are also available to plan and
design cellular architecture.

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Cells
A cell is the basic geographic unit of a cellular system.
The term cellular comes from the honeycomb
(hexagonal) shape of the areas into which a coverage
region is divided theoretically.
Cellwise, one base station provides transmission over
a small geographic area.
Cell sizes vary depending on the landscape
(topographic locations such as mountains, valleys,
and plains).
Due to the constraints imposed by natural terrain and
man-made structures, practically, the cells are not
perfect hexagons.

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Cluster
A group of cells form a cluster , the size of which is
denoted as N.
Figure illustrates a seven-cell cluster. Each cluster is
allocated a set of frequencies. N is restricted by the
following equation:

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Reaching to co-channel cell

non-negative integers i
and j determine the relative locations
of co-channel cells, as shown
in Figure.
i = vertical move, j = slant horizontal
move

A relationship exists between the

cluster design equation and
frequency reuse as well as reuse
distance.
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Cell Size
The size of a cell depends on the density of
subscribers in an area.
The capacity of a network in a densely populated
area can be improved by reducing the size of the
cells or by increasing the number of cells along with
installing low-power base stations. This will
efectively increase the number of channels in that
area because of more frequency reuse.
On the basis of their size, cells may be categorized
as macrocells, microcells , picocells, and femtocells .

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Cell Splittingfor maximizing number

of users

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Cellular Frequency Reuse

A radio channel consists of a pair of frequencies for full
duplex operation.
The concept of frequency reuse is based on assigning to
each cluster the same group of radio channels used
within a small geographic area. A set of N different
frequency groups {f1, ..., fN} is used for each cluster of N
adjacent cells and shared among the cells almost equally.
The set of frequencies assigned to a cell is completely
diferent from that assigned to the neighbouring cells.
The coverage area of the cells is called the footprint
surrounded by outer boundary of the cell.
If there are seven members in a cluster, number of
available frequency sets is seven, the frequency reuse
factor is 1/7. This means that each cell uses one-seventh
of the available cellular channel for reuse.
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Let L = total number of duplex channels available for reuse (i.e.,

frequencies per cluster)
k = number of duplex channels allocated to each cell of a cluster (k
< L)
N = cluster size (in which there are N cells)
M = number of times the cluster is repeated
C = total effective number of duplex channels available in the area
Thus, L = k N
C = M L = MkN

Cluster of seven cells

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Reuse distance (D)

calculation

For Example:

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Real world cells

Cellular planning can be

done by using various
softwares and planning
tools

screenshot of Ericsson TEMS

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Cellular system components

There are three types of cellular systems
1. Analog Circuit-switched Cellular System
Mobile Unit or mobile subscriber unit (MSU)
Cell Site or base station
Mobile Telecommunication Switching
Office
(for connection management and billing)

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Cellular system components

2. Digital Circuit-switched Cellular
System
Mobile Station
Base Station or Base Transceiver Station
Base Station Controller
Switching Subsystems

3. Packet-switched Cellular System

It has six elements: MS (user equipment), base
station, radio network controller(RNC), service
support node (SSN), gateway support node (GSN),
and charging gateway function (CGF).

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Example of digital circuit switched cellular system

example (GSM system)

To be studied in Chapter 11
In detail.

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Antennas for cellular

systems

Two main types of antennas are used

in the wireless industry for a BTS
omnidirectional
and directional

Omnidirectional
sectors

Directional with 3

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Antennas for cellular

systems

Omnidirectional antennas are nothing but the dipoles and

they radiate in all lateral directions.
A directional antenna shapes and projects a beam of radio
energy in a specific direction and receives radio energy only
from a specific direction, employing various horizontal
beamwidths.
Here, the term beamwidth refers to the conical size of the
radiated beam.
Downtilting---The radiation pattern of a downtilt antenna is
electrically or mechanically tilted downwards at a specified
number of degrees to avoid shadowing under and near the
antenna zone.
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Antennas for cellular

systems

A base station antenna is chosen according to the

situation depending upon many factors, such as
the following:
Size of the area to be covered
Configurations of the neighbouring cell sites
Type of antenna usedomnidirectional or
directional
Antennas beamwidth in case of a directional
antenna
Allotted RF spectrum the antenna can utilize

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Adverse Efects of Base

Stations
The probable adverse efects of the radiation from the base
stations are a major concern, especially among residents in
urban areas. Independent monitoring of RF exposure levels
around mobile phone base stations has been conducted for
many years under the control of government agencies.

Radiation pattern from base station (Lighter shades of grey indicate

decreasing power strength)

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Antennas for Mobile Radio Frequency

Front End
Currently, PIFA (planar inverted-F antennaa shorted patch)
wideband antennas are used widely and sometimes fractal
antennas are also used. PIFA is the modified version of the
quarter-wavelength patch antenna.
As the patch is shorted at the end, the current at the end of
the patch antenna is no longer forced to be zero. This
results in the same currentvoltage distribution as that of a
half-wave patch antenna. The antenna is resonant at a
quarter-wavelength, thus reducing the space needed on the
telephone; moreover, it typically has good specific
absorption rate (SAR) properties. It has a low profile and an
omnidirectional pattern.

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Operations of cellular
systems
1. Mobile-originated
Call
There are two possibilities in a mobile-originated call:
mobile-to-mobile call and mobile-to-landline call .
As an example, the call set-up sequences for mobile-originated
calls in a GSM system are given in Fig. 11.3 in Chapter 11

Stages for Mobile-originated Call

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Operations of cellular
systems
2. Mobile-Terminated
Call
There are two possibilities:
mobile-to-mobile call and landline-to-mobile call

Stages for Mobile-terminated Call

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Steps
Mobile-originated calls are routed to the BTS first and then
to the BSC.
The BSC forwards this call to the MSC.
The MSC authenticates and routes the call to the called
subscriber as per the dialled digits.
If the called subscriber is in mobility, the process to
receive the call on his mobile device is described in
Section 2.5.2
Mobile-terminated calls come to the MSC first, where the
HLR/VLR enquiry is carried out, and as per the
information, the MS is paged in the suitable BSC.
The BSC forwards this page to all BTSs where the actual
paging is done.
After a BTS gets a response from the mobile, it allocates
a channel for this call.
On ending
the
call,University
the BTS
informs
BSC and MSC.
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Network-originated or Landlineoriginated Call

A feature called registration is used for landlineoriginated calls.
A landline user dials a mobile unit number.
The telephone company zone office recognizes that
the call is for a mobile number and forwards it to the
MTSO/MSC.
The MTSO/MSC sends a paging message to certain
cell sites based on the mobile unit number and the
search algorithm. Each cell site transmits the page
on its own set-up channel.
If the mobile unit is registered, the registered site
pages the mobile. The mobile unit recognizes its own
identification
on a strong set-up channel, locks onto it, and
the
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Call Termination
When a mobile user turns of the transmitter, a
particular signalling tone is transmitted to the cell
site and the voice channel is freed by both the
sides.
The mobile unit resumes monitoring pages through
the strongest set-up channel.

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Handof Procedure
Handoff is also
known as
handover.
It can be
categorized as:
hard handover
soft handover
softer handover

Hard Handover scenario

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Few terms associated with the handof

procedure
Handoff probability It is the probability that a handof is executed
before call termination.
Rate of handover It is the number of handovers per unit time.
Interruption duration It is the duration of time during a handover
procedure in which a mobile is not connected to any base station.
Handoff delay It is the distance between the point at which the
handof should occur and the point at which it does occur.
Probability of unsuccessful handoff It is the probability that a
handof is executed while the reception conditions are inadequate.
Handoff blocking probability It is the probability that a handover
cannot be completed successfully.
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Handover margin

The handof occurs only if the new base station is sufficiently

stronger than the current one by handover margin .
Hard handover scheme prevents the ping-pong effect.
Hard handover procedure exhibits hysteresis .
Handover strategies The following are the two different
strategies for
handover:
(a) Centralized methods (used in GSM)
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(b) Decentralized methods
[used
in DECT
(WLL)]

Methods of hand-of
Mobile-assisted handoff The mobile measures the power
received from the surrounding base stations and continuously
reports the results of the measurements to the serving base
station. A handof is initiated when the power received from the
base station of a neighbouring cell begins to exceed that from
the current base station by a certain level or a certain period of
time. This method is currently being used in the mobile systems.
Base station-assisted handoff In the first-generation
systems, the strength measurements are made by the base
stations and supervised by the MTSO. Here, the base station
measures the signals from the mobiles served by it, as well as
from the mobiles in the neighbouring cells and reports to the
MTSO. The MTSO decides whether a handof is necessary as well
as who needs it. Here, the load of the MTSO is more compared to
the mobile-assisted method, and hence handofs are slower.
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Soft Handover
It allows the MSC to make a soft decision regarding
the version of the users signal to pass.
The ability to select between the instantaneous
received signals from a variety of base stations is
called soft handover. The technique is discussed in
detail in Chapter 11.
More suitable for CDMA based systems.

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Figure for Example 2.3

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Channel Assignment
Fixed Channel Assignment In the fixed channel assignment method, each cell is
allocated a predetermined set of voice channels. Only the unused channels in a
particular cell can serve any call attempt within that cell. If all the channels are
occupied, then the call will be blocked and the subscribers will not get any service.
Borrowing StrategyIn the borrowing strategy method, a cell is allowed to borrow a
channel from a neighbouring cell, if all of its own channels are occupied. The MSC
supervises the borrowing procedure and ensures that the borrowing of the channel
does not disrupt or interfere with any of the calls in progress in the donor cell.
Dynamic Channel Assignment In the dynamic channel assignment method, voice
channels are not allocated permanently in any of the cell. When a call request is
made, the serving base station requests a channel from the MSC, which then
allocates a channel to the requested cell.

Advantages of the dynamic channel assignment --the likelihood of call blocking reduces, co-channel
interference reduces and channel utilization increases.

Disadvantage is that the MSC must be fast and capable of collecting real-time data on channel
occupancy, traffic distribution, and radio signal strength indications of all channels on a continuous
basis.

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Cellular interferences
Two major types of
cellular interferences
are co-channel
interference and
adjacent channel
interference.

Cochannel Interference
due to this scenario

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Co-channel interference
calculations
The co-channel cells surrounding a particular cell exist in a circular
(or rather hexagonal) pattern. There will be maximum interference
from the nearest circle of cells, which are also called first-tier cells
and are always six in number. Based on that the signal-tointerference ratio (SIR) for a mobile receiver

where S is the desired signal power from the desired base station
and Ii is the interference power of the base station of the ith
interfering co-channel cell (neglecting noise). n is the path loss
exponent. The empirical value of n ranges from two to five.
Based on the distance of the interfering base stations to the
desired mobile receiver Di, D/R ratio and cluster size N

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Co-channel interference
calculations
where k is the proportionality constant, which depends on the
power radiated by the base station at the centre. I represents
the power radiated by the other base stations in the first tier,
which are six in number.
Hence,
From above two equations

From the equation it is clear that N should be designed

critically for the desired SIR.
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SINR for adjacent channel

interference
Adjacent channel
interference can be
minimized through
careful filtering at IF
stages and careful
channel
assignments.

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Sectorization
Sectorized base stations are created by subdividing an omnicell
into sectors that are covered using directional antennas mounted
in the same base station location. Following is the example of 3
sector division and each sector is treated as diferent cell.
To sectorize a cell, a
horizontal, equilateral
platform resembling a
triangle is deployed
on a tower. Each side
of the platform is
called a face. Three,
four, or six directional
antennas are installed
on
the
platform,
depending
on
the
number of sectors.

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Why Sectorization
Sectorization facilitates wireless engineering and
operations in the following ways:

It
minimizes
or
eliminates
co-channel
interference.
It optimizes the frequency reuse plan. This is
facilitated through another concept known as the
front-to-back ratio .
At a minimum, it triples the capacity of any given
coverage area when compared to the capacity
ofered by deploying omni-antennas.

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Mobile traffic calculation

Traffic calculation is essential to both mobile phone
and landline systems.
On the basis of the traffic condition, the telephone
system must be designed such that only a minimum
number of calls are blocked and uninterrupted
service is provided to the subscribers.
The traffic varies considerably throughout a day, but
most systems are designed to handle the traffic
during the peak busy hour in a day.

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Traffic variation in a small business firm as per normal

activities in a day from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. is shown in figure
by average traffic measured every hour

In teletraffic engineering, trunk describes any entity that will carry

one call. The number of trunks connecting one MSC with another is
the number of voice pairs used in the connection; hence, it is
important to determine the number of trunks required between the
MSCs.
Trunking efficiency refers to the decrease in call blocking and
increase in coverage without call drops, at the cost of management
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overhead.

Some definitions

Call blocking It is the non-availability of any trunk or call propagation

path.
Busy hour or peak busy hour It is the 60-min interval in which the
traffic or the number of call attempts is the highest in a day. It usually
varies from day to day or over a number of days.
Time-consistent busy hour It is the one hour period starting at the
same time each day for which the average traffic volume or the
number of call attempts is the highest over the days under
consideration.
Call completion rate It is the ratio of the number of successful calls
to the number of call attempts. It can be represented in percentage.
Busy hour call attempts It is the number of call attempts in the
busy hour and it decides the network capacity.
Average busy hour calls (completed) = Busy hour call attempts call
completion rate
Busy hour calling rate It is the average number of calls originated by
a subscriber during the busy hour or the call intensity per traffic path
during the busy hour.
Day to busy hour traffic ratio It is the ratio of busy hour calling rate
to the average
calling
for thePress
day.2014.
It indicates
how much of the
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Some
Contd
definitions

Centum call second (CCS) It represents the calltime product and is a

traffic measurement unit. 1 CCS is one call for a duration of 100 s or 100
calls for 1 s duration each or any other combination. Other measures are
call seconds (CS) and call minutes (CM).
Average call arrival rate It is the average number of calls that arrive
during the specified time duration.
Average call holding time It is the average duration of calls that arise
within the specified time duration or the average duration of occupancy
of a traffic path by a call.
Erlang It is the unit of traffic that represents the total use of one
channel or one call per hour that lasts for one hour.
Set-up time It is the time required to allocate a trunk (or trunked radio)
channel.
Blocked call or lost call It is the call that cannot be completed due to
lack of channels.

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Traffic Characterization

Traffic intensity, more commonly called the traffic, is defined as

the average number of calls in progress. Although this is a
dimensionless quantity, the unit of traffic has been given a
nameerlang (abbreviated as E).
In a group of channels, the average number of calls in progress
depends on both the number of calls that arrive and their
duration. The duration of a call is often called its holding time .
The traffic carried by a group of trunks is given by
Where, A is the traffic in erlangs, c is the average number of call
arrivals during time T , and h is the average call holding time.

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Call Handling and Grade of

Service
When all the channels become occupied, the system cannot
accept further calls. This state is known as congestion .
The arrival of a new call can then be handled by either of the
following two methods:
(a) Blocked (for a lost call system based on circuit switching)
(b) Queued (for a delayed system based on message or
packet switching)

Traffic carried = Traffic ofered - Traffic lost

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The proportion of calls lost or delayed due to congestion is

used to measure the service quality, called the grade of
service (GOS). The GOS B for a lost call system may be
defined as
B = Number of calls lost/Number of calls offered
B = Traffic lost/Traffic ofered
= Probability that a call will be lost due to congestion

Thus, if a traffic of A erlangs is offered to a group of trunks or

channels having a GOS B , the traffic lost is AB and the traffic
carried is
A (1 B ) erlangs.
Larger the GOS value, worse will be the service provided.
Erlang B and C tables are readily available in Appendix F

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Mathematical Modelling of
Traffic

A simple mathematical model is based on the following

assumptions:
Pure chance traffic--If the traffic is pure chance, all
call arrivals and call terminations are independent
random events, therefore, sometimes called
memoryless traffic . A commonly used model for
random, mutually independent message (here, call)
arrivals is the Poisson process .
Statistical equilibrium--According to the statistical
equilibrium assumption, the generation of traffic is
a stationary random process; that is, the
probabilities do not change during the period being
considered. Consequently, the mean number of
calls in progress remains constant.
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Poisson Process
The probability of two or more arrivals happening
during is negligible compared to the probability of
zero or one arrival.
The distribution of the number of arrivals in a time
interval of t to t + T is independent of the starting
time t . T is the interval between call arrivals or the
interval between two random events.
The probability of the number of call arrivals in a
given time has a Poisson distribution given by

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Markov model for a number of occupied channels

in a network wit N channels

P(1), P (2), , P ( N ) are the state probabilities .

P0,1 , P1,2 ,and so on are the probabilities of a state increment.

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Erlang B Formula
Erlang determined the GOS (i.e., the loss
probability) of a lost call system having N
trunks when the ofered traffic is A . The
solution/formula was obtained on the basis of
the following assumptions.:
Pure chance traffic
Statistical equilibrium
Full availability
Loss of calls encountering congestion
The formula is

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Erlang C Formula
In an Erlang C telephone system, N channels
are available. New calls are assigned a channel
until all channels are full. When all the channels
are occupied, a new call is queued until it can
be served. This is in contrast to an Erlang B
system in which new calls are blocked.
The assumptions made here are the same as in
an Erlang B system, except the fourth one.
The formula is

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Spectrum efficiency of cellular

systems
Let

k = number of channels per cell

N = cluster size
Wchannel = total bandwidth for the cellular net
Wsignal = occupied bandwidth per channel
Then Wchannel = kNWsignal
The spectrum efficiency SE of a cellular net can be defined as the
carried traffic per cell Ac, expressed in erlangs, divided by the
bandwidth of the total system Wchannel and the area of the cell
Su. Ac is mostly computed from the Erlang B formula, with Ac
equal to the attempted traffic multiplied by the probability of
success (= 1 blocking probability). Spectrum efficiency is
expressed in erlang/MHz/

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Location management
The study of location management aims at tracking a
subscriber (with an active mobile unit) on move and
at reducing the overhead incurred in locating that
subscriber in a cellular environment, though he/she
moves continuously from cell to cell. Actually,
mobility management in cellular systems consists of
two components:
handover management
location management.

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Location management
In literature, location update schemes are classified into two main
groups:
Static or global scheme Location update is triggered based on the
topology of the network.
Dynamic or local scheme A mobile sends a location update
message according to the time elapsed (time-based method), the
number of cells visited (movement-based method), or the distance in
terms of cells travelled (distance-based method).

The following are a few terms related to location management:

Centre cell It is the cell where the last location update occurred.
Residing area It is the area in which the mobile unit can be located.
Polling cycle It is the process performed by the network when a call
arrives at a mobile terminal. The network sends a polling signal to
the target cell in the residing area and waits for the response.
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