Communications

How to optimise digital modulation accuracy in an IQ modulator? Bruce Hemp and Peter Stroet from Linear Technology describe how a vector signal analyser helps optimise EVM performance of the LTC5598 direct quadrature modulator. EVM, or error vector magnitude, is essentially a scalar measurement of digital modulation accuracy, an important figure of merit for any source of digital modulation. Low ...

Apple is thought to be developing its own super low power display technology for iPhones. This is the latest example of Apple looking to take ownership of the core semiconductor technologies in its mobile phones. It has been designing its own processors and system-on-chip devices for at least two generations of the iPhone. A report on Bloomberg, says Apple’s low ...

The spectrum and channel bandwidth requirements of 5G mobile communications is raising test challenges. For example, 5G mobile radio will use microwave and millimeter‑wave frequencies and it will have larger channel bandwidth. According to Rohde & Schwarz, one of the test requirements of 5G will be channel sounding. “5G developers need to know the exact transmission path characteristics in order to measure ...

The EU Directive 2013/35/EU on the minimum health and safety requirements regarding the exposure of workers to the risks arising from physical agents (the electromagnetic field)  published in mid-2013 is due to be transposed into UK law by July of next year, 2016. Howard Venning, managing director of Aspen Electronics, lifts the lid on the subject and offers help to reach ...

Bell Labs, the research arm of Alcatel-Lucent has demonstrated an optical fibre communications technology which it says has the potential to increase today’s 10 to 20 Terabit-per-second fibre capacities to Petabit-per-second capacity – the equivalent of 1,000 Terabits/s. With the comms market moving to 5G wireless technology, Bell Labs estimates that, within about a decade there will be an acute ...

CMOS RF chips continue to make an impact on mobile phone design and a US-based start-up has developed a CMOS power amplifier which will support multi-band 3G/LTE designs, writes mobile reporter Tom Wilson. ACCO Semiconductor says it is in production of a CMOS Multi-mode Multi-band Power Amplifier (MMPA) which supports quad-band GSM/EDGE and 12-band 3G/LTE smartphones. “The AC26120 represents a fundamental ...

David Hawke highlights the role programmable hardware is making in research and development of technologies such as massive MIMO for the 5G mobile communications radio access network. The goals for the so-called radio access network (RAN) for 5G mobile are lofty indeed and have been discussed at length by industry experts. What has received far less airtime is, “What exactly ...

The strength of current UK-based technology start-ups was evident at the Discovering Start-Ups 2015 competition when the winners were announced in London today. The winners ranged from smart glasses for the blind and an online platform for gene testing to an industrial wireless sensor network, real-time risk assessment system for cyber-attacks and a new reversible software debugger. The judges included ...

The Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) has announced the general availability of its Bluetooth Developer Studio. This a free development environment for developers get to grips with Bluetooth technology, aiming to cut developer learning time for Bluetooth technology and speed product development. It makes building for the IoT simple for developers, from the novice to the experienced, boasts the SIG, ...

5G mobile may be five years away from the commercial market but technology being developed for the next generation mobile networks is to be used to improve today’s 4G mobile communications. Technology for managing the densely packed network infrastructure needed for 5G can also improve data download speeds in 4G networks. Ericsson is running a trail of a network signalling ...