Symbol-error performance and bit-error performance for 2-dimensional signals

Abstract

Due to the technological progress in today’s society, communication systems have become essential and unavoidable. The efficiency of the communication greatly relies on the choice of transmission modulation schemes in addition to the characteristics of channels. This project aims to compute the Symbol Error Rate (SER) and Bit Error Rate (BER). Moreover, this research also examines how various modulation schemes cope with various channel conditions to maximize the performance of digital communication systems.

The main purpose of this project is to compare the SER and BER performances for different Phase Shift Keying (PSK) and Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM) schemes. Three different channel conditions – Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN), Rayleigh fading, and Rician fading – will be used to compute these. To provide relevant information for various communication environments, this research aims to determine the best modulation schemes for each channel type.

This project used MATLAB to simulate each modulation scheme under the given channel conditions. The BER and SER were calculated for each combination of modulation and channel type. The process involved generating random sequences of bits, modulating them using the chosen schemes, transmitting them through the channels, and then demodulating them to measure the errors.