Yousef Khojah: Digitally-Assisted Analog Wireless Communication System Using Software-Defined Radio

Overview

Digitally-Assisted Analog Wireless Communication System Using Software-Defined Radio

Abstract

The process of designing a new communication system is complicated and has to be precise in terms of the operating frequency and the components that will be used. However, there are ways to modify a pre-designed communication system and tune it without building a new one. Meeting the market’s demand for more flexible communication solutions, this project investigates the use of external components to overcome the limitations of a pre-designed communication system using the principles of software-defined radio (SDR). The specifications of a communication system could be expanded by digital control, which would increase its capabilities and enhance its specifications. The aim is to broader the bandwidth and range of frequencies of the communication system ME1000 to transmit and receive at different desired operating frequencies and add new features that were not in the device's original design. I characterized all the available components from antennas, power amplifiers, local oscillators, band-pass filters, and each building block in the system itself. I set the input power and frequency to test those components, and then calculate the gain and losses in power of the received signal. After that, the final communication system design was based on a 200MHz signal and 300MHz carrier. In the process of building the system successfully and programming the SDR, the experiment has been done ten times, trying different files to send and different digital modulation techniques. To conclude with, enhancing this pre-designed communication system would save money and improve the area coverage for designing and executing various information exchange channels since it can be tuned and used for many purposes.

Brief Biography

I'm a high school senior and an SRSI alumnus passionate about electrical engineering and would like to major in it at one of the most prestigious universities in the US. Currently, I'm applying for KGSP scholarship to pursue this dream and hope to continue my master's and Ph.D. studies at KAUST and become a researcher. Also, I am competing with this project in the national olympiad for scientific research and qualified to the final stage among the top 150 projects.