International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 20-23, 2003 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / The impact of multipath fading parameters on the probability of error for Offset QPSK (OQPSK) is derived. The multipath fading channel is modeled using the aeronautical telemetry channel model [1-2]. Expressions for the probability of bit error are derived that are a function of the multipath model parameters. The expressions are shown to agree with computer simulations and show that a strong multipath reflection with a short delay causes much more degradation than a weak multipath reflection with a long delay.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 23-26, 2000 / Town & Country Hotel and Conference Center, San Diego, California / Telemetry receiving sites at missile test ranges almost always use polarization diversity to maximize the quality of the telemetry signals collected from missiles during developmental tests. If the sites are operating optimally, their sensitivity should be independent of received polarization. In this paper a technique to test the sensitivity of each receiving site is presented that involves radiating from a central location with selectable polarization and precise power level. Results of testing five telemetry sites are presented and compared with performance predicted through link analysis using site G/T and location information.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 21, 2002 / Town & Country Hotel and Conference Center, San Diego, California / End-to-End testing is a tool for verifying that Range Telemetry (TM) System Equipment will deliver satisfactory performance throughout a planned flight test. A thorough test verifies system thresholds while gauging projected mission loading all in the presence of expected interference. At the White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) in New Mexico, system tests are routinely conducted by Range telemetry Engineers and technicians in the interest of ensuring highly reliable telemetry acquisition. Even so, flight or integration tests are occasionally halted, unable to complete these telemetry checks. The Navy Standard Missile Program Office and the White Sands Missile Range, have proactively conducted investigations to identify and eliminate problems. A background discussion is provided on the serious problems with the launcher acquisition, which were resolved along the way laying the ground work for effective system testing. Since there were no provisions to test with the decryption equipment an assumption must be made. Encryption is operationally transparent and reliable. Encryption has wide application, and for that reason the above assumption must be made with confidence. A comprehensive mission day encrypted systems test is proposed. Those involved with encrypted telemetry systems, and those experiencing seemingly unexplainable data degradations and other problems with or without encryption should review this information.

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Physical-Layer Network Coding (PNC) is a promising technique that has great potentials for improving the achievable data rates of end-to-end flows through higher packet transmission rates, thereby increasing the overall network throughput. In this thesis, we study the performance of the PNC transmission techniques for unidirectional end-to-end flows in multi-hop wireless networks, and compare it with that of the traditional transmission techniques. We first derive the bit-error rate (BER) that the PNC transmission technique achieves. Then, using the derived BER, we evaluate and quantify the achievable network throughput under both the PNC transmission technique and the traditional technique, where the network throughput is measured as the aggregate/sum of all end-to-end flows' achievable data rates in the wireless network. Using extensive simulations, we show that PNC increases the overall achievable end-to-end flow throughput in multi-hop wireless networks, especially under medium to high signal-to-noise ratios. / Graduation date: 2012

With the fast adoption of LTE and IEEE 802.11N, more devices are employing multiple antennas to boost the data rate and reliability of the communication link. Traditionally, fixed antennas are used in such devices. In recent years, reconfigurable antennas have been sought out to further boost the performance, which can adaptor to the changing wireless channel by altering their radiation characteristics, and maintain or exceed the performance of fixed antennas. This thesis studies the possibility of performance increase using pattern reconfigurable antennas as receivers. Their performance potential was first estimated using simulations, and then demonstrated using two electrically steerable passive array radiator (ESPAR) antennas against a pair of monopole antennas on a hardware bit error rate (BER) testbed. The former produces equal performance in BER with certain pattern combinations and excels in theoretical capacity with substantial lead making pattern reconfigurable antenna a potent option as receiver in MIMO-related applications.

With the fast adoption of LTE and IEEE 802.11N, more devices are employing multiple antennas to boost the data rate and reliability of the communication link. Traditionally, fixed antennas are used in such devices. In recent years, reconfigurable antennas have been sought out to further boost the performance, which can adaptor to the changing wireless channel by altering their radiation characteristics, and maintain or exceed the performance of fixed antennas. This thesis studies the possibility of performance increase using pattern reconfigurable antennas as receivers. Their performance potential was first estimated using simulations, and then demonstrated using two electrically steerable passive array radiator (ESPAR) antennas against a pair of monopole antennas on a hardware bit error rate (BER) testbed. The former produces equal performance in BER with certain pattern combinations and excels in theoretical capacity with substantial lead making pattern reconfigurable antenna a potent option as receiver in MIMO-related applications.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 23-26, 2000 / Town & Country Hotel and Conference Center, San Diego, California / The presence of multipath fading has been shown to degrade the performance of a wireless channel. This paper quantifies the effects of multipath interference on signal performance based on the estimated parameters of the multipath signal. Theoretical results are compared with actual results obtained through the Advanced Range Telemetry (ARTM) program.

The world's demand for energy is an ongoing challenge, which has yet to be overcome. The efforts to find clean energy alternatives to fossil fuels have been hampered by the lack of investment in technology and research. Among these clean energy alternatives are ocean waves and wind. Wind power is generated through the use of wind generators that harness the wind's kinetic energy; it has gained worldwide popularity as a large-scale energy source, but only provides less than one percent of global energy consumption. Due to infrastructure limitations on installations of wind turbines at locations where high winds exist, wind energy faces critical challenges difficult to overcome to continue improving electricity generation. Ocean wave energy on the other hand seems like a promising adjunction to wind energy. Ocean energy comes in a variety of forms such as marine currents, tidal currents, geothermal vents and waves. Most of today's research however is based on wave energy. It has been estimated that approximately 257 Terawatt hour per year (TWh/year) could be extracted from ocean waves alone. This amount of energy could be enough to meet the U.S. energy demands of 28 TWh/year. Technologies such as point absorbers, attenuators and overtopping devices are examples of wave energy converters. Point absorbers use a floating structure with components that move relative to each other due to the wave action. The relative motion is used to drive electromechanical or hydraulic energy converters. The total energy throughput of a single point absorber however, does not justify for the great engineering cost and effort by researchers. Thus the need to explore other alternatives of wave conversion that result in no extra-added cost but yet increases throughput. Our research focuses on exploring a novel method to maximize wave energy conversion of an array-based point absorber wave farm. Unlike previous research, our method incorporates a predictive control algorithm to aid the wave farm with the prediction of dynamics and optimal control trajectory over a finite time and space horizon of ocean waves. By using a predictive control algorithm, wave energy conversion throughput can be increased as opposed to a system without. This algorithm requires that the wave characteristics of the incoming wave be provided in advance for appropriate processing. This thesis focuses on designing an efficient and reliable wireless communications system capable of delivering wave information such as speed, height and direction to each point absorber in the network for further processing by the predictive control algorithm. This process takes place in the presence of harsh environmental conditions where the random shape of waves and moving surface can further affect the communication channel. In this work we focus on the physical layer where the transmission of bits over the wireless medium takes place. Specifically we are interested in reducing the bit error rate with a unique relaying protocol to increase packet transmission reliability. We make use of cooperative diversity and existing protocols to achieve our goal of merit and improve end-to-end system performance. / Graduation date: 2012

Echo state network (ESN) is a specific neural network structure composed of high dimensional nonlinear dynamics and learned readout weights. This thesis considers applying ESN for symbol detection in multiple-input, multiple-output orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (MIMO-OFDM) systems. A new ESN structure, namely, windowed echo state networks (WESN) is introduced to further improve the symbol detection performance. Theoretical analysis justifies WESN has an enhanced short-term memory (STM) compared with the standard ESN such that WESN can offer better computing ability. Additionally, the bandwidth spent as the training set is the same as the demodulation reference signals defined in 3GPP LTE/LTE-Advanced systems for the ESN/WESN based symbol detection. Meanwhile, a unified training framework is developed for both comb and scattered pilot patterns. Complexity analysis demonstrates the advantages of ESN/WESN based symbol detector compared to conventional symbol detectors such as linear minimum mean square error (LMMSE) and sphere decoder when the system is employed with a large number of OFDM sub-carriers. Numerical evaluations show that ESN/WESN has an improvement of symbol detection performance as opposed to conventional methods in both low SNR regime and power amplifier (PA) nonlinear regime. Finally, it demonstrates that WESN can generate a better symbol detection result over ESN. / Artificial neural networks (ANN) are widely used in recognition tasks such as recommendation systems, robotics path planning, self-driving, video tracking, image classifications, etc. To further explore the applications of ANN, this thesis considers using a specific ANN, echo state network (ESN) for a wireless communications task: MIMO-OFDM symbol detection. Furthermore, it proposed an enhanced version of the standard ESN, namely, windowed echo state network (WESN). Theoretical analyses on the short term memory (STM) of ESN and WESN show that the later one has a longer STM. Besides, the training set size of this ESN/WESN based method is chosen the same as the pilot symbols used in conventional communications systems. The algorithm complexity analysis demonstrates the ESN/WESN based method performs with lower complexity compared with conventional methods, such as linear mean square error (LMMSE) and sphere decoding. Comprehensive simulations examine how the symbol detection performance can be improved by using ESN and its variant WESN when the transmission link is non-ideal.