
1 Introduction to Radio Systems4
The source of the information in Fig. 1.3 (block 1), may be a microphone, a
video camera, a temperature sensor, an accelerometer, a seismic sensor, a fluid level
sensor or any other device ( transducer) that transforms the desired information into
an electrical signal.
The electrical (baseband) signal, in turn, is amplified (block 2) and usually
passed through a lowpass filter to limit its bandwidth. The carrier frequency, or a
sub-multiple of it, is generated by an RF oscillator (block 3), which is then multi-
plied and amplified (block 4) to establish the desired frequency. Due to the need
for operation at the precise assigned frequency, the oscillator stability is typically
controlled by a highly stable resonator, such as a quartz crystal.
One or more amplifier stages may be employed to increase the power level of the
signal from that produced by the oscillator to that needed for input to the modulator
(block 5). A variety of power amplification topologies may be used for obtaining
high efficiency, for example, class C [2].
The modulator takes in two inputs, namely, the information-bearing (baseband)
signal and the carrier frequency, and produces the modulated output carrier. If a
higher power level than the one produced by the modulator is desired, additional
amplification (block 6) may be added so the desired power level to be transmitted
by the antenna (block 7) is reached.
On the other hand, the transmitted information is captured by a receiver,
Fig. 1.3b. The receiving antenna (block 8) utilized may be omnidirectional for gen-
eral service, or highly directional for point-to-point communication. The received
wave induces a small voltage in the receiving antenna, with amplitudes ranging
from tens of millivolt to less than a microvolt, depending on a wide variety of
conditions, in particular, the nature of the intervening transmitter-receiver space
or channel. Notice that, en-route to the receiver, the transmitted signal picks up
noise from the environment; this refers to random signals which alter the amplitude,
phase, or frequency of the transmitted carrier. The received signal delivered by the
antenna is amplified by a low noise amplifier (LNA) (block 9) to increase the signal
power to a level appropriate for input to a mixer. The LNA also provides isolation
between the local oscillator (LO) (block 10) and the antenna, as well as increasing
the received signal amplitude to overcome the noise that is inevitably introduced in
the mixer (block 11). The mixer is a nonlinear circuit which produces multiples of
the sum and difference of the RF and local oscillator (LO) signal frequencies, thus
frequency-translating the received carrier signal, f
RF
, to the intermediate frequency,
f
IF
, where demodulation is to be effected. In the receiver architecture shown, the LO
is tuned to produce a frequency that differs from the incoming signal frequency f
RF
by the intermediate frequency f
IF
; in other words, f
LO
can be equal to either f
RF
+ f
IF
or f
RF
− f
IF
. The IF amplifier (block 12) increases the signal amplitude to a level ap-
propriate for detection, and provides most of the frequency selectivity necessary
to “pass” the desired signal and reject the undesired signals that are found in the
mixer’s output spectrum. The detector (block 13) extracts the original message from
the modulated IF input. The extracted signal is amplified (block 14) to an amplitude
that is appropriate for driving a loudspeaker, a television tube, or other output de-
vice. The output transducer (15) converts the signal information back to its original
form, e.g., a sound wave, a picture, etc.