Cellular Networks

Jingyuan Zhang, University of Alabama

Ivan Stojmenovic, University of Ottawa, Canada

Introduction

Basic Concepts

Multiple Access Methods

Location Management

Hand-Off Strategies and Channel Assignment

Authentication and Encryption

Evolution of Cellular Networks

Alternatives to Cellular Networks

Summary

Acknowledgments

Glossary

Cross References

References

INTRODUCTION

Cellular communications has experienced explosive growth in the past two decades. Today millions of people around the world use cellular phones. Cellular phones allow a person to make or receive a call from almost anywhere. Likewise, a person is allowed to continue the phone conversation while on the move. Cellular communications is supported by an infrastructure called a cellular network, which integrates cellular phones into the public switched telephone network.

The cellular network has gone through three generations. The first generation of cellular networks is analog in nature. To accommodate more cellular phone subscribers, digital TDMA (time division multiple access) and CDMA (code division multiple access) technologies are used in the second generation (2G) to increase the network capacity With digital technologies, digitized voice can be coded and encrypted. Therefore, the 2G cellular network is also more secure. The third generation (3G) integrates cellular phones into the Internet world by providing highspeed packet-switching data transmission in addition to circuit-switching voice transmission. ...

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