Communications Toolbox
Design and simulate the physical layer of communications systems
Communications Toolbox™ provides algorithms and apps for the analysis, design, end-to-end simulation, and verification of communications systems. Toolbox algorithms including channel coding, modulation, MIMO, and OFDM enable you to compose and simulate a physical layer model of your standard-based or custom-designed wireless communications system.
The toolbox provides a waveform generator app, constellation and eye diagrams, bit-error-rate, and other analysis tools and scopes for validating your designs. These tools enable you to generate and analyze signals, visualize channel characteristics, and obtain performance metrics such as error vector magnitude (EVM). The toolbox includes SISO and MIMO statistical and spatial channel models. Channel profile options include Rayleigh, Rician, and WINNER II models. It also includes RF impairments, including RF nonlinearity and carrier offset and compensation algorithms, including carrier and symbol timing synchronizers. These algorithms enable you to realistically model link-level specifications and compensate for the effects of channel degradations.
Using Communications Toolbox with RF instruments or hardware support packages, you can connect your transmitter and receiver models to radio devices and verify your designs with over-the-air testing.
Get Started:
Modulation and Channel Coding
Specify system components for channel coding (including convolutional, turbo, LDPC, and TPC), modulation (including OFDM, QAM, APSK), scrambling, interleaving, and filtering.
RF satellite link.
Receiver Design and Synchronization
Model and simulate front-end receiver and synchronization components including AGC, I/Q imbalance correction, DC blocking, and timing and carrier synchronization.
Correct frequency offset QAM using coarse and fine synchronization.
Link-Level Performance Metrics
Characterize link-level performance with BER, BLER, PER, and throughput measures.
Estimating LDPC performance in an AWGN channel.
Noise and Fading Channels
Simulate channel noise and fading models, including AWGN, multipath Rayleigh fading, Rician fading, and WINNER II spatial channel models.
Multiple fading channels with WINNER II channel model.
RF Impairments
Model effects of RF impairments, including nonlinearity, phase noise, I/Q imbalance, thermal noise, and phase and frequency offsets.
End-to-end QAM simulation with RF impairments.
Wireless Waveform Generator App
Generate, impair, visualize, and export modulated waveforms (including OFDM, QAM, PSK, and WLAN 802.11).
Generation, visualization, and exporting waveforms, and applying RF impairments.
Standards-Based Waveforms
Generate waveforms compliant with various standards including, DVB, MIL-STD 188, television and FM broadcasting, ZigBee®, NFC, WPAN 802.15.4, cdma2000, and 1xEV-DO signals.
DVB-S.2 link, including LDPC coding.
MIMO Techniques
Simulate the effects of massive MIMO hybrid beamforming. You can also perform transmit and receive diversity, and simulate effects of space-time block coding and spatial multiplexing on system performance.
Massive MIMO hybrid beamforming.
MIMO Channels and Receivers
Apply MIMO multipath fading and WINNER II spatial channel modeling, and model MIMO receiver components, including MIMO channel estimation and equalization.
Multi-user MIMO with WINNER II channel model.
Signal Visualizations
Use Constellation Diagram and Eye Diagram scopes to visualize the effects of various impairments and corrections.
Visualizing and measuring signals with Eye and Constellation diagrams.
Signal Measurements
Compute standard measurements (including EVM, ACPR, ACLR, MER, CCDF, eye height, jitter, rise time, fall time) for quantitatively characterizing system performance.
EVM measurements for a ZigBee system.
Supported Radios
Connect your waveforms to a variety of supported software-defined radios (SDRs) including ADALM® Pluto®, RTL-SDR, USRP® and Xilinx® Zynq®-based radios.
Transmitters and Receivers
Process captured or live over-the-air wireless signals for applications including airplane tracking with ADS-B Signals, automatic meter reading, FM broadcasting with RBDS, and FRS/GMRS receiver.
Processing captured SDR signals for spectrum sensing.
Waveform generation, link-level simulation and testing
Generate waveforms and simulate Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and Bluetooth® Basic Rate (BR) and Extended Data Rate (EDR) links. Perform standard tests and measurements defined by the Bluetooth RF-PHY Test Specifications.
Visualizing Carrier to Interference Performance Tests.
Mesh Network simulation and interference modeling
Model and simulate Bluetooth mesh networks. Simulate coexistence mechanisms to analyze the interference of WLAN on BLE network.
Bluetooth mesh network message flow.
Protocol layer and MAC modeling
Generate and decode BLE link layer packets and L2CAP frames. Model link layer state machines used to establish connections between BLE devices.
Protocol for exchanging packets between a client (smartphone) and a server (sensor).
Packetized Communications
Model and simulate packetized modems, including data link layer processing with ALOHA or CSMA/CA MAC algorithms.
Standards-Based MAC Frames
Generate and decode MAC frames for various standards including ZigBee (IEEE® 802.15.4) and NFC.
ZigBee MAC frame generation and decoding.
RF fingerprinting with deep learning
Design and train a radio frequency (RF) fingerprinting convolutional neural network (CNN) with simulated and captured data
Bluetooth Low Energy BR/EDR waveform generation and link-level simulation
Generate, demodulate, and decode Bluetooth® basic rate (BR) and extended data rate (EDR) PHY waveforms
RF propagation using ray tracing
Predict the total received power and generate coverage maps with ray tracing
See the release notes for details on any of these features and corresponding functions.
