With code division multiple access (CDMA) systems being the prominent multiple access scheme for the air interface for 3G cellular systems, most standardisation bodies have based their terrestrial cellular systems on DS-CDMA (W-CDMA, UMTS, cdma2000). With 4G systems fast approaching, bringing with them improved services and quality of service standards, there is growing interest in further investigating and developing more efficient multiple access techniques such as multicarrier CDMA (MC-CDMA) systems. MC-CDMA combines multicarrier modulation (MCM), namely OFDM, with CDMA profiting from the benefits of both multiplexing techniques; as such, MC-CDMA is emerging as a possible candidate for the air interface multiple access scheme for 4G cellular systems. Multiple access interference (MAI) is a limiting factor of CDMA systems in terms of system capacity as orthogonally designed spreading sequences lose their orthogonality in the presence of timing misalignments amongst mobile subscribers in a cell; such is the case over the uplink channel. Ensuring orthogonal code properties minimises the MAI over synchronous environments, however, it is when the users are allowed to transmit asynchronously, as is the case over the uplink channel, that MAI inflicts significant performance degradation. In CDMA systems, all subscribers are active on the same frequency band simultaneously and signal separation is facilitated upon reception via the properties of the assigned spreading codes. Under asynchronous conditions the code properties alone do not provide the necessary separation and an additive MAI term remains in the detection process. In addition to the separation abilities of the spreading codes, a further method of deciphering the desired subscriber signal from the interfering subscriber signals is sought. In this thesis we propose a statistical model for both the probability density function (pdf) of the total MAI power and the corresponding bit-error rate (BER) observed during asynchronous CDMA transmission. The modelling offers the full statistic the MAI power and resulting BER, not just the first and second order statistics. In addition to statistically quantifying the MAI power, the thesis also proposes a technique for the successful reduction of MAI caused by asynchronous transmission. This interference reduction technique is derived from an ambiguity domain analysis of the asynchronous CDMA detection problem and its application to both the DS-CDMA and MC-CDMA multiplexing techniques is presented and the results show significant MAI reduction, and thus an improved the BER. A methodology for the approximation of the total MAI power pdf and the resulting BER pdf is proposed for the asynchronous DS-CDMA and MC-CDMA techniques. This methodology is derived for the use of Walsh-Hadamard (WH) and Gold spreading sequences, however, it is applicable to any given set of deterministic spreading sequences. The total MAI power pdfs of both systems are statistically modelled as being Nakagamim distributed and the corresponding BER modelling is derived from the Nakagami-m formulation offering the full statistic of both the incurred MAI power and the achievable BER. The proposed pdf acquisition methodology and statistical models can be used as analysis tools to assess the relative performances of the DS-CDMA and MC-CDMA techniques for a variety of communications environments. Here the asynchronous uplink channel is considered in the absence of fading and the results show a clear distinction between the BER performances of the MC-CDMA and DS-CDMA systems, for which the MC-CDMA system offers a superior performance for the purely asynchronous channel considered. The results suggest a higher resistance to MAI in the MC-CDMA technique in comparison to the DS-CDMA system for the considered transmission scenario. Following ambiguity function analysis of the asynchronous CDMA detection problem, the concept of dual-frequency switching is introduced to the existing DS-CDMA and MC-CDMA techniques giving rise to the proposed dual-frequency DS-CDMA (DF/DSCDMA) and dual-frequency MC-CDMA (DF/MC-CDMA) schemes. Periodically switching the carrier frequency between dual frequency bands at consecutive symbol boundaries facilitates partial CDMA signal separation upon asynchronous reception. Such switching of the carrier frequency induces a separation in frequency between offset interference signals and the reference signal; this is equivalent to shifting the energy concentration of the interference signals away form the ambiguity domain origin (representing the decision variable of the matched filter). Further MAI reduction is demonstrated through careful design of the dual carrier frequencies. The newly proposed DF systems clearly outperform the standard DS-CDMA and MC-CDMA systems when adopting equivalent spreading factors. The DF/DS-CDMA technique in particular achieves the most MAI reduction and in doing so, surpasses all other considered techniques to offer the best BER performance for the purely asynchronous channel considered. In terms of bandwidth usage, the DF/DS-CDMA band width is 1.5 times that of the DF/MC-CDMA system and from the BER results presented, one may argue that DF/MC-CDMA offers the better BER given the bandwidth usage. The multicarrier systems presented, MC-CDMA and DF/MC-CDMA, offer attractive BER performances for the bandwidth used and it is concluded that MC-CDMA is a genuine candidate for the uplink air interface multiple access scheme for future mobile cellular technologies.

A destilação é um processo de separação com uma alta demanda de energia, razão pela qual, através de diferentes épocas tem sido estudadas diferentes configurações. O problema da separação de misturas multicomponente pode envolver sequências de colunas de destilação convencionais. Neste caso, surge um problema combinatório a fim de projetar a sequência mais econômica de separação. Por outro lado, em anos recentes têm sido proposto o uso de equipamentos alternativos, sendo as colunas com paredes divididas uma opção bastante estudada que se caracterizam pela integração de 2 seções de colunas compartilhando um único condensador e um único refervedor. Estes equipamentos propõem diminuir o custo total de processo de separação de misturas multicomponentes. Neste trabalho apresenta-se um estudo econômico da separação de três misturas ternárias de Benzeno, Tolueno, P-xileno, comparando os projetos ótimos de sequências convencionais e de colunas de paredes divididas. Inicialmente, são definidas as variáveis de projeto para cada configuração por meio de uma análise de graus de liberdade. O dimensionamento é realizado inicialmente com o método não rigoroso de valor de fronteira. Finalmente, as sequências diretas e indiretas e as colunas de parede divididas são projetadas usando modelos rigorosos, baseados no método de ponto de bolha, programação matemática para resolver os problemas de otimização do Custo Total Anualizado TAC com variáveis contínuas e enumeração exaustiva para tratar o problema combinatório. São obtidos projetos ótimos para uma alimentação com três composições diferentes. A sequência indireta forneceu o melhor resultado para a alimentação rica no componente mais pesado (-58,35%) e no componente intermediário (-45,98%). Já a sequência direta foi a melhor quando a alimentação é rica em componente leve (-33,36%). A coluna com parede dividida teve o pior desempenho em todos os três casos estudados. / Distillation is a high-energy demand separation process, for that reason, alternative configurations have been studied through the ages. The separation problem of multicomponent mixtures may involve a sequence of conventional distillation columns. In this case, a combinatorial problem arises in order to design the most economical separation sequence. On the other hand, in recent years the use of alternative devices has been proposed. One of those options is the divided wall column, which is extensively studied, and is characterized by the integration of two column sections sharing a single condenser and a single reboiler. This equipment is sought to decrease the total cost of the separation process for multicomponent mixtures. This work presents an economic study for the separation of three ternary mixtures of benzene, toluene and p-xylene, comparing the optimum design of conventional sequences and divided wall columns. Initially, the design variables are defined for each configuration through a degrees of freedom analysis. The sizing is initially performed with the boundary value shortcut method. Then, the direct and indirect sequences, and divided wall columns are designed using rigorous models based on the bubble point method. Mathematical programming is used for solving the optimization problems of minimization of the total annualized cost (TAC) with continuous variables and exhaustive enumeration to handle the combinatorial issue. Optimal designs for three feeds with different compositions are obtained. The indirect sequence provided the best result for the feed rich in the heaviest component (-58.35 %) and in the intermediate component (-45.98 %). The direct sequence result was the best when the feed composition is rich in lighter component (-33.36 %). The divided wall column had the worst performance in all three cases studied.

In general, PN code synchronization consists of two steps: PN code acquisition (coarse alignment) and PN code tracking (fine alignment), to estimate the delay offset between received and locally generated codes. Recently, the schemes with a joint adaptive process of PN code acquisition and the weight coefficients of smart antenna have been proposed for improving the received signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) and simultaneously achieving better mean-acquisition-time (MAT) performance in direct-sequence code-division multiple access (DS-CDMA) systems. In which, the setting of the threshold plays an important role on the MAT performance. Often, the received SINR is varying, using the fixed threshold acquisition algorithms may result in undesirable performance. To improve the above problem, in this thesis, a new adaptive threshold scheme is devised in a joint adaptive code acquisition and beam-forming DS-CDMA receiver for code acquisition under a fading multipath and additive white Gaussian-noise (AWGN) channels. The basic idea of this new adaptive threshold scheme is to estimate the averaged output power of smart antenna to scale a reference threshold for each observation interval, such that it can approximately achieve a constant false alarm rate (CFAR) criteria. The system probabilities of the proposed scheme are derived for evaluating MAT under a slowly fading two-paths channels. Numerical analyses and simulation results demonstrate that the proposed adaptive threshold scheme does achieve better performance, in terms of the output SINR, the detection probability and the MAT, compared to a fixed threshold method.

Third generation mobile communication systems promise a greater data rate and new services to the mobile subscribers. 3G systems support up to 2 Mbps of data rate to a fixed subscriber and 144 Kbps of data rate to a fully mobile subscriber. Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) is the air interface access scheme widely used in all the 3G communication systems. This access scheme has many inherent advantages m terms of noise immunity, security, coherent combining of multi path signals etc. But all these advantages come at the expense of higher complexity of the receivers. The receivers form the major portion of the processing involved in a base station. The heart of any CDMA receiver is the RAKE. The RAKE receiver separates the different multi-paths received by the antenna by using the properties of the Pseudo Random sequences. The phase and strength of each of these path signals is measured and are used by the coherent combiner, which de-rotates all the signals to a single reference and coherently combines them In general the Base station receivers make use of the top three multi-path signals ranked in terms of their signal energy Hence four RAKE fingers, each catering to single multi-path are needed for receiving a single code channel (3 for coherent combining and one for scanning). One such channel receiver requires a processing power of 860 MIPS (Mega Instructions Per Second). Some of the CDMA standards support up to 90 code channels at the same time. This means that the total processing power required at the base station is about 80 GIPS. This much of processing power will require large number of high end DSPs, which will be a very costly solution. In the current base station architectures these blocks are implemented using ASICs, which are specific to a particular standard and also the algorithms used for the different operations are fixed at the design time itself. This solution is not flexible and is not amenable for SDR (Software defined Radio) architectures for the Base stations. This thesis proposes a Co-Processor solution, which can be attached to a generic DSP or any other processor. The processor can control the Co-Processor by programming its parameter registers using memory mapped register accesses. This co-processor implements only those blocks, which are compute intensive. This co-processor performs all chip-rate processing functions involved m a RAKE receiver. All the symbol-rate functions are implemented through software in the processor. This provides more choices m selecting the algorithms for timing recovery and scanning. The algorithms can be changed through software even after the base station is installed in the field. All the inputs and outputs of the Co-Processor are passed through dual port RAMs with independent read and write clocks. This allows the Co-Processor and the processor to be running on two independent clocks. This memory scheme also increases the throughput as the reads and writes to these memories can happen simultaneously. This thesis introduces a concept of incorporating programmable PN/Gold code generators as part of the Co-Processor, which significantly reduces the amount of memory required to store the Scrambling and Spreading codes. The polynomial lengths as well as the polynomials of the code generator are programmable. The input signal memory has a bus width equal to 4 times the bus width of the IQ signal bus width (4 * 24 = 96 bits) towards the Co-Processor to meet the huge data bandwidth requirement. This memory is arranged as word interleaved memory banks. This can supply one word per memory bank on each clock cycle as long as the accessed words fall in different memory banks. The number of banks is chosen as more than twice that of the number of Correlators/ Rake fingers. This gives more flexibility in choosing the address offsets to different Correlator inputs. This flexibility allows one to use different timing recovery schemes since the number of allowable address offsets for different Correlators is more. The overall complexity of the solution is comparatively less with respect to the generic DSP based solution and much easier to modify for a different standard, when compared to the rigid ASIC based solution. The proposed solution is significantly different from the conventional way of designing the Base station with fixed ASICs and it clearly outweighs the solutions based on conventional approach in terms of flexibility, design complexity, design time and cost.

Direct-Sequence Code Division Multiple Access (DS-CDMA), over the last few years, has become a popular technique and finds a place in many modern communication systems. The performance of this technique is closely linked to the signature (or spreading) sequences employed in the system. In the past, there have been many successful attempts by research groups to construct families of signature sequences that offer the potential gains promised by theoretical bounds. In this thesis, we present constructions of families of signature sequences over the AM-PSK and QAM alphabet with low correlation. In this thesis, we construct a family of sequences over the 8-ary AM-PSK constella- tion, Family AOpt(16) that is asymptotically optimal with respect to the Welch bound on maximum magnitude of correlation for complex sequences. The maximum magnitude of correlation for this family, θmax, is upper bounded by √N , where N is the period of the sequences. The 8-ary AM-PSK constellation is a subset of the 16-QAM constellation. We also construct two families of sequences over 16-QAM, Family A16A, and Family A16,B , with the maximum magnitude of correlation upper bounded by √2√N . We construct a family, A(M 2), of sequences over the 2m+1-ary AM-PSK constellation of period N = 2r- 1 and family size (N + 1)/2m-1 . The 2m+1-ary AM-PSK constellation is a subset of the M 2-QAM constellation with M =2m . The maximum nontrivial normalized correlation parameter is bounded above by θmax < a √N where a ranges from 1.34 in the case of M 2 = 16 to √5 for large m. Apart from low correlation values, the family possesses several interesting and useful features. In Family A(M 2), users have the ability to transmit 2m bits of data per period of the spreading sequence. The sequences in Family A(M 2) are balanced; all points from the 2m+1-ary AM-PSK constellation occur approximately equally often in sequences of long period. The Euclidean distance between the signals assigned to a particular user in A(M 2), corresponding to different data symbols, is larger than the corresponding value for the case when 2m+1-PSK modulation and spreading is used. Perhaps most interestingly, Family A(M 2) permits users on the reverse link of a CDMA system to communicate asynchronously at varying data rates by switching between different QAM constellations. Family A(M 2) is compatible with QPSK sequence families S(p) in the sense that the maximum correlation magnitude is increased only slightly if one adds sequences from (p) S(p)\ S(0) to Family A(M 2). We also construct families of sequences over AM-PSK that tradeoff data rate per sequence period and θmax for a given family size. We have extended the construction of sequences over AM-PSK constellation to construct sequences over the M 2-QAM constellation for M =2m . The QAM sequence families, Families (AM 2), have size, data rate and minimum squared Euclidean distance same as the corresponding AM-PSK construction but have higher values of θmax. Also included in the thesis are constructions for large families of sequences over the M 2-QAM alphabet.