Method Scrutinizes Behavior Of WCDMA Signals With A Spectrum Analyzer

FREQUENCY-SELECTIVE MEASUREMENTS using a spectrum analyzer are one of the proven techniques for measuring the power of a communications signal, even for complex waveforms such as used in wideband code-division-multiple-access (WCDMA) systems. Researchers Christof Olivier and Luc Martens from Ghent University (Ghent, Belgium) uses analytical expressions for analyzing the statistical nature (such as the power spectral density) of these complex signals in order to both understand the signals as well as the nature of the spectrum-analyzers used to measure these signals .That is, the spectrum analyzer was as much a part of their modeling exercise as was the WCDMA signal, allowing them to optimize the performance of the different types of detectors (peak, RMS) used with the spectrum analyzer. See "Theoretical Derivation of the Stochasic Behavior of a WCDMA Signal Measured With a Spectrum Analyzer," IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement, April 2006, Vol. 55, No. 2, p. 603.