Unlike Wi-Fi, Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) technology provides a high-speed communication in a wide area. The IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX) standard of wireless mesh networks is one of the widely used BWA standards. WiMAX mesh mode achieves data transmission in conflict-free manner in multihop networks by using the control messages (three way handshake messages or MSH-DSCH messages) to reserve channel for sending data. Concurrently, the coordination of three way handshake messages depends on the mechanism named Election based Transmission Timing (EBTT). However, IEEE 802.16 mesh mode uses a static holdoff algorithm, which leads to a low performance in the majority of cases. In this paper, after analyzing the IEEE 802.16 mesh mode with coordinated distributed scheduling, we propose a novel method to improve the throughput by a dynamic holdoff algorithm. The simulation results show that our proposal gets a better throughput performance.

The mixer is a crucial circuit block in a WiMax system receiver. The performance of a mixer depends on three specifications: conversion gain, linearity and noise figure. Many mixers have been recently proposed for UWB and wideband systems; however, they either cannot achieve the high conversion gain required for a WiMAX system or they are prone to high power consumption. In this paper, a folded mixer with a high conversion gain is designed for a 2-11GHz WiMAX system and it can achieve a 20MHz IF output signal. From the simulation results, the proposed folded mixer achieves a conversion gain of 18.9 to 21.5dB for the full bandwidth. With a 0.2 to 4.4dBm IIP3, the NF is 13.5 to 17.6dB. The folded mixer is designed using TSMC 0.18µm CMOS technology. The core power consumption of the mixer is 11.8mW.

With the proliferation of hand-held devices in recent years, mobile video streaming has become an extremely popular application. However, Internet video streaming to mobile devices faces several problems, such as unstable connections, long latency, high jitter, etc. We present a system, OptVid, which enhances the user's experiences of video streaming service on cellular networks. OptVid takes the user's profile and provides seamless adaptive bitrate streaming by leveraging the video transcoding solution. It provides very agile bitrate adaptation, especially in the mobile scenario where the wireless channel is not stable. We prototype video transcoding on a WiMAX testbed to bridge the gap between the wireless channel capacity and the video quality. Our evaluations reveal that OptVid provides better user experience than conventional schemes in terms of PSNR, video stalls, and buffering time. OptVid does not require any additional storage since it transcodes videos on-the-fly upon receiving requests and delivers them directly to the client.

This paper presents an improved Mobile WiMAX handover (HO) algorithm for real-time application by using a Link_Going_Down (LGD) trigger technique. Mobile WiMAX is a wireless networking system based on the IEEE 802.16e standard. In order to support phone mobility, a HO scheme of some kind must be adopted, and in this standard hard handover (HHO) is defined as mandatory. Since, the fact that there will be a pause in data transmission during the HO process, delay in communication will occur. Thus, the HO time (>50ms) can degrade system performance when implemented in real-time applications such as Video Streaming or Internet Protocol Television (IPTV). Additionally, the HHO takes approximately 300ms because the HO process doesn't start at the best point. The HHO standard considers only the received signal strength (RSS) to decide initiation. The mobile station velocity is also an important factor in HO initiation that should not be neglected. To deal with the problems of handover delay, this paper proposes a new HO scheme. This scheme adopts the dynamic HO threshold that used LGD technique to define the starting HO process. This technique is based on the RSSD (measured by the Doppler Effect technique), mobile velocities and handover time. Consequently, the HO process starts at the right time and HO time is reduced (<50 ms) and the network resource utilization is enhanced to be more efficient.

This paper describes the circuit design and measurement results of a new GaAs-HBT RF power detector proposed for use in WiMAX and wireless LAN transmitter applications. The detector, which is based on a simple current-mirror topology, occupies a small die area. It is, therefore, not only easy to implement together with a GaAs-HBT power amplifier, but can also offer approximately logarithmic (linear-in-dB) characteristics. Because it can also be driven with small voltage amplitudes, it is suitable for base-terminal monitoring at an HBT power stage. When the detector is used as a base-terminal power monitor, an appropriate base resistance added to the detection HBT effectively suppresses frequency dispersion of the detected voltage characteristics. Measurements of a prototype detector incorporated into a single-stage HBT power amplifier fabricated on the same die are as follows. The detector is capable of delivering a detected voltage of 0.35-2.5 V with a slope of less than 0.17 V/dB over a 4-to-24-dBm output power range at 3.5 GHz while drawing a current of less than 1.8 mA from a 2.85-V supply. While satisfying a log conformance error of less than 1 dB over an amplifier output power range from 4 dBm to 24 dBm, it can also suppress the detected power dispersion within 0.18 dB at approximately 15 dBm of output power over a 3.1-3.9-GHz-wide frequency range. This dispersion value is approximately one-tenth that of a conventional collector-terminal-monitor-type diode detector.

This paper describes circuit design and measurement results of a newly proposed GaAs-HBT step-gain amplifier configuration and its application to a 3.3-3.6 GHz WiMAX power amplifier module for use in customer premises equipment. The step-gain amplifier implemented using only a usual HBT process is based on a current-mirror-based, base-collector diode switches and a passive attenuator core for the purpose of bypassing a power-gain stage. The stage allows an individual design approach in terms of gain and attenuation levels as well as large operating current reduction in the attenuation state. To confirm the effectiveness of the proposed step-gain amplifier, a prototype of the amplifier was designed and fabricated, and then a WiMAX power amplifier module was also designed and fabricated as an application example of the proposed configuration to an amplifier product. Measurements are as follows. For a 3.5-V power supply and a 3.5-GHz non-modulated signal, the step-gain amplifier delivers 23.7 dBm of 1-dB gain compressed output power and 10.7 dB of linear gain in the amplification state. In the attenuation state, the amplifier exhibits 21 dBm of 1-dB gain expanded input power, -9.7 dB of gain, and 15 mA of current dissipation while keeping the gain stage switched off and maintaining input and output return loss of less than -10 dB at a 3.5-GHz band. The WiMAX amplifier operating with a 5-V supply voltage and a 64-QAM modulated signal is capable of delivering a 28.5-dBm linear output power, a 37-39 dB gain, and 15% of PAE over a wide frequency range from 3.3 to 3.6 GHz in the high-gain state while keeping error vector magnitude as low as 2.5%. This amplifier, which incorporates the proposed step-gain configuration into its interstage, enables a 24-dB gain reduction and a 45-mA large quiescent current reduction in the low-gain state.

Two types of 3D folded dipole antenna with feed line (FDAFL) were reported for a small terminal, which covered WiMAX 2.5/3.5GHz bands and WLAN 2.4GHz band. In this study, folded monopole antenna (FMA) is proposed as a variant of FDAFL. We show the broadband characteristics of FMA and determine the most suitable configuration of FMA array for realizing MIMO system. Also, a multiband variant is created by introducing a parasitic element to FMA. The result is a multiband FMA array with parasitic elements operating at 5GHz band of WiMAX and WLAN as well as WiMAX 2.5/3.5GHz bands and WLAN 2.4GHz band with total antenna efficiency of between 70% to 96% and the envelope correlation coefficient of less than 0.02. Finally, a prototype antenna is implemented, and we confirm the validity of the simulation by comparison to measured results.

In this paper, we propose a synthesizable LDPC decoder IP core for the WiMAX system with high parallelism and enhanced error-correcting performance. By taking the advantages of both layered scheduling and fully-parallel architecture, the decoder can fully support multi-mode decoding specified in WiMAX with the parallelism much higher than commonly used partial-parallel layered LDPC decoder architecture. 6-bit quantized messages are split into bit-serial style and 2bit-width serial processing lines work concurrently so that only 3 cycles are required to decode one layer. As a result, 12∼24 cycles are enough to process one iteration for all the code-rates specified in WiMAX. Compared to our previous bit-serial decoder, it doubles the parallelism and solves the message saturation problem of the bit-serial arithmetic, with minor gate count increase. Power synthesis result shows that the proposed decoder achieves 5.83pJ/bit/iteration energy efficiency which is 46.8% improvement compared to state-of-the-art work. Furthermore, an advanced dynamic quantization (ADQ) technique is proposed to enhance the error-correcting performance in layered decoder architecture. With about 2% area overhead, 6-bit ADQ can achieve the error-correcting performance close to 7-bit fixed quantization with improved error floor performance.

Folded dipole antenna with feed line (FDAFL) whose relative bandwidth is 65% (VSWR≤3) has been reported as a wideband planar antenna for a small terminal. However, this antenna is constructed outside of the ground plane (50×80mm2) by 12mm. In this study, we analyze the antenna configurations of FDAFL in 3D so that the antenna does not protrude from the ground plane as much as possible. Two different 3D antenna models derived from FDAFL are investigated. The first model is folded over the ground plane, and the second one is folded outside of the ground plane. The relative bandwidth, the VSWR characteristics and radiation patterns are studied. As a result, it is confirmed that antenna prominence could be reduced and broadband characteristics over 74% and 83% are obtained by the 3D models, respectively, which are wider than the bandwidth of conventional 2D model. Thus, FDAFL could be used in both 2D and 3D for a small terminal.

This paper deals with two types of capacity allocation schemes, i.e., static and adaptive, for uplink and downlink burst durations in the IEEE 802.16 BE (Best Effort) service. We study QoE (Quality of Experience) enhancement of audio-video IP transmission over the uplink channel with the two capacity allocation schemes. We introduce a piggyback request mechanism for uplink bandwidth requests from subscriber stations to the base station in addition to a random access-based request mechanism. We assess QoE of audio-video streams for four schemes obtained from the combination of the capacity allocation schemes and the bandwidth request mechanisms. We also employ two types of audio-video contents. From the assessment result, we notice that the adaptive allocation scheme is effective for QoE enhancement particularly under heavily loaded conditions because of its efficient usage of OFDM symbols. In addition, the piggyback request mechanism can enhance QoE of audio-video transmission. We also find that the effects of capacity allocation schemes and piggyback request mechanism on QoE change according to the content types.

The paper presents capability of signal detection for realizing coexistence between broadband wireless access (BWA) systems and ultra wideband (UWB) devices. The capability is experimentally evaluated for baseband signals of downlink (DL) in both mobile WiMAX and 3GPP LTE. An UWB receiver based on fast Fourier transform (FFT) compliant with MB-OFDM standard is implemented as a detector of the BWA signals. The capability is evaluated in terms of elapsed time required to achieve signal detection with probability of 99% by the implemented FFT-based UWB receiver at different conditions of the receiver. Decisions on the signal detection are made by the simplest method which is by setting a threshold which is determined by noise floor of the receiver as reference. The experiments have been conducted though baseband signals for both AWGN and multipath fading channels without any synchronization between the DL signals and UWB receiver. In AWGN environment, results show that the elapsed time depends on the duty ratio of the DL signal to be detected, however, the correlation between the required time and duty ratio is not linear since their envelopes of the DL signals are not constant. In multipath fading environments based on channel models commonly employed as mobile radio environments, the required time for the signal detection becomes as 17 times longer than that in AWGN due to its signal attenuation. For robust signal detection in multipath fading environments, it has been revealed that the number of quantization bits at ADC is crucial through the experiments.

Structured quasi-cyclic low-density parity-check (QC-LDPC) codes have been adopted in many wireless communication standards, such as WiMAX, Wi-Fi and WPAN. To completely support the variable code rate (multi-rate) and variable code length (multi-length) implementation for universal applications, the partial-parallel layered LDPC decoder architecture is straightforward and widely used in the decoder design. In this paper, we propose a high parallel LDPC decoder architecture for WiMAX system with dedicated ASIC design. Different from the block by block decoding schedule in most partial-parallel layered architectures, all the messages within each layer are updated simultaneously in the proposed fully-parallel layered decoder architecture. Meanwhile, the message updating is separated into bit-serial style to reduce hardware complexity. A 6-bit implementation is adopted in the decoder chip, since simulations demonstrate that 6-bit quantization is the best trade-off between performance and complexity. Moreover, the two-layer concurrent processing technique is proposed to further increase the parallelism for low code rates. Implementation results show that the decoder chip saves 22.2% storage bits and only takes 2448 clock cycles per iteration for all the code rates defined in WiMAX standard. It occupies 3.36 mm2 in SMIC 65 nm CMOS process, and realizes 1056 Mbps throughput at 1.2 V, 110 MHz and 10 iterations with 115 mW power occupation, which infers a power efficiency of 10.9 pJ/bit/iteration. The power efficiency is improved 63.6% in normalized comparison with the state-of-art WiMAX LDPC decoder.

We observe that the state-of-the-art power-saving mechanisms (PSM) for IEEE 802.16e is neither optimal in terms of delay nor in terms of energy consumption. We propose a new PSM which achieves the optimality in terms of the average buffering delay without increasing energy consumption. In order to do so, we derive a formula which relates the average buffering delay to sleep intervals. Simulation results show that our scheme surpasses the BTE algorithm (used by the current IEEE 802.16e Mobile Stations) by 56.75–76% and the PSID algorithm by 8.52–24.39% in terms of the delay-energy consumption product.

WiMAX wireless communication has been rapidly developed for broadband mobile communication. Mobile WiMAX communication system uses microwave carrier of 2.5 GHz frequency band and modulation is OFDM mainly. By using OFDM technique, WiMAX provide high speed and reliable communication against multi pass interferences due to the presence of obstacles in communication channels. To design excellent high performance mobile communication systems, accurate evaluation of communication system is indispensable. By using parallel FDTD, we studied fundamental characteristics of microwave propagation and scattering in urban area. We also studied wave propagation and scattering by forest and trees using FDTD method. The effects of multiple scattering and attenuation of microwave by forest are severe factors of high speed wireless communications. In this paper, signal propagation and receiving characteristics of OFDM modulated wave are studied by parallel FDTD method. Propagation, reflection, scattering, interference and delay of digital code signals in received code signals are evaluated to show the environmental characteristics. Parallel FDTD methods are applied for signal and noise analysis about several different complex models and inhomogeneous materials such as forests in long distance communication channels.

As we are moving toward next generation wireless networks, we are facing the integration of heterogeneous access networks. The main challenge is to provide mobile users moving freely across different radio access technologies with satisfactory quality of services for a variety of applications. Consequently, the seamless roaming over heterogeneous networks is an important concern. To minimize the disruption to the ongoing session when a mobile user is moving from one access network to another, we propose a framework that integrates IEEE 802.11 WLANs and IEEE 802.16 WMANs based on the IEEE 802.21, so-called Media Independent Handover (MIH), to facilitate both homogeneous and heterogeneous handovers. Both numerical analysis and simulation results show that seamless roaming between WLAN and WMAN can be achieved and much better performance can be obtained compared with the IEEE 802.21 standard approach.

The research on body-centric wireless communications (BCWCs) is becoming very hot because of numerous applications, especially the application of E-health systems. Therefore, a small multi-band and low-profile planar inverted-F antenna (PIFA) with tuning function is presented for BCWCs in this paper. In order to achieve multi-band operation, there are two branches in the antenna: the longer branch low frequency band (950–956 MHz), and the shorter branch with a varactor diode embedded for high frequency bands. By supplying different DC voltages, the capacitance of the varactor diode varies, so the resonant frequency can be tuned without changing the dimension of the antenna. While the bias is set at 6 V and 14 V, WiMAX and ISM bands can be covered, respectively. From the radiation patterns, at 950 MHz, the proposed antenna is suitable for on-body communications, and in WiMAX and ISM bands, they are suitable for both on-body and off-body communications.

This letter proposes two efficient schemes for the joint estimation of symbol timing offset (STO) and carrier frequency offset (CFO) in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) based IEEE 802.16e systems. Avoiding the effects of inter symbol interference (ISI) over delay spread by the multipath fading channel is a primary purpose in the letter. To do this, the ISI-corrupted CP is excluded when a correlation function is devised for both schemes, achieving the improved performance. To demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed methods, the performance is compared with the conventional method and is evaluated by the mean square error (MSE), acquisition range of CFO, and complexity comparison.

In this paper, a fifth order curer low-pass filter using as switched-capacitor (SC) architecture is proposed and fabricated with TSMC 0.18 µm CMOS process. A fully differential SC is adopted via the bilinear transform of the corresponding analogue RLC passive prototype. To reach the largest possible input dynamic range and save chip area, the method of dynamic range scaling and minimum capacitor scaling is used. Measured results show that the proposed filter achieves a pass-band of 12.1 MHz with a sampling rate of 100 MHz, a SFDR of 50 dB, a stop-band attenuation greater than 50 dB and a power consumption of 48.5 mW at 1.8 V power supply. Including pads, the chip area occupies 1.515 (1.391.09) mm2. This paper has the feature of low noise, excellent linearity of the filter, and high stability. The experimental results show that it has perfect performance for WiMAX applications and standard is recommended.

To manage limited energy resources efficiently, IEEE 802.16e specifies sleep mode operation. Since there can be no communication between the mobile station (MS) and the serving base station (BS) during the unavailability interval, the MS can power down its physical operation components. We propose an improved power saving mechanism (iPSM) which effectively increases the unavailability interval of Type I and Type II power saving classes (PSCs) activated in an MS. After investigating the number of frames in the unavailability interval of each Type II PSC when used with Type I PSC, the iPSM chooses the Type II PSC that yields the maximum number of frames in the unavailability interval. Performance evaluation confirms that the proposed scheme is very effective.

We propose a high-speed and low-complexity architecture for the very large-scale integration (VLSI) implementation of the maximum a posteriori probability (MAP) algorithm suited to the double binary turbo decoder. For this purpose, equation manipulations on the conventional Linear-Log-MAP algorithm and architectural optimization are proposed. It is shown by synthesized simulations that the proposed architecture improves speed, area and power compared with the state-of-the-art Linear-Log-MAP architecture. It is also observed that the proposed architecture shows good overall performance in terms of error correction capability as well as decoder hardware's speed, complexity and throughput.