Wireless Communication Has Evolved Much

Wireless communication has evolved much since the 1880's when Marconi first invented the radio. Since then wireless communication was mostly used for military purposes during World War 1 and 2. However, the proliferation of television and the era of computers offered a whole new domain of wireless applications. Today, wireless LANs provide an entirely new level of service that cannot be offered by traditional wired communication. Wireless networks have considerably influenced our day-to-day life. The new applications of Wireless networks have drastically improved our connectivity from a limited to an ever-expanding world of information. The birth of cellular technology, infrared and spread spectrum radio services have revolutionized our world of communication. The continuous progress in Wireless technology has made the dream of a mobile workforce already a reality. Let us briefly touch upon the various important developments of wireless communication devices and protocols such as the bluetooth, EDGE, the emergence of 3G networks, and the future of wireless technologies.

Bluetooth

Bluetooth was born in 1998 from a joint effort of IBM, Ericsson, Intel, Nokia and Toshiba. Bluetooth represents a single chip, radio-based wireless network that considerably reduces the cost factor involved in a typical wireless infrastructure. Bluetooth offers total freedom from wired networks and infrastructure-based wireless networks. Bluetooth uses frequency band in the range of 2.4 GHZ and uses frequency hopping as well as time-division duplex scheme of data transmission. Typically a hopping rate of 1,600 hops per second is used. [Jochen Schiller, 206] by using the radio communication, bluetooth technology enables communication between the different portable communication devices thereby totally eliminating the use of cables. This is made possible by embedding small radio chips called 'Bluetooth chips' inside the gadgets. This way, data that is transmitted by the blue chip in the transmitting gadget, can be deciphered back by the blue chip at the receiving gadget. By partnering with UWB, Bluetooth SIG is all set towards a whole new future and new applications for the technology. [University of Denver]

EDGE

Over the last few years enhancements have been made to the existing 2G (GSM), 2.5 G (GPRS) networks. EDGE (enhanced data rates for GSM evolution) has considerably increased the data transfer rates for mobile phones so that high-speed technologies such as Internet could be accessible over the phone. EDGE provides high-speed packet access (HSPA) for any packet switching application. As a simple software upgrade, EDGE has almost tripled the speed of existing GSM networks and provided a cost effective solution for 3G networks. With EDGE / WCDMA, a mobile user can be continuously connected on roaming anywhere in the world. EDGE offers a smooth transition into the world of 3G mobile services currently in vogue even as research is already on into the development of 4G communication networks. [Timo Halonen]

Ultra Wideband

The development of much faster and economical wireless systems continues at a rapid pace. We are on the verge of ultra fast wireless systems as the technology still awaits the federal commission approval. This much-awaited UWB (ultra wideband transmission) would have a tremendous impact on short-range wireless communication. Though the technology in itself is not new (been used for more than two decades in military radar operations) only recently it has begun to be tested for business communications. Researchers point out UWB is at least 1000 times faster than currently used 802.11b or bluetooth technologies and hence could constitute an excellent alternative choice of protocol for local area networks, increasing their ability to cater to many more users at high bandwidth speeds and at considerably lower costs. As Mr. Frank Dzubeck, president of Washington based 'Communications Network Architects' says, '"The initial approval from the FCC might be, for example, for 100M bit/sec with a range of 150 feet. But there's no reason why you can't increase speed and distance. it's a matter of power and finer granularity of the silicon chips." [John Cox] One interesting feature of UWB is that it operates in the same frequency as the electronic noise spectrum and because UWB pulses do not need a carrier wave (carrier free architecture) it does not chunk up the already crowded radio spectrum.

Another new development is the GIFI chip which offers very high-speed data transfers over short regions. Developed by Australian researchers, the GiFi chip measures only.2 inches on either side and operates in the mostly neglected above 60-GHz spectrum region. Though restricted to only a maximum distance of 11 yards, this GiFi chip is much faster than the normal WiFi devices. The speed of 5 Gpbs per second of data transmission is a new breakthrough, which implies that even high definition movies could be transferred between devices in a matter of a few seconds. This sensational GiFI chip is widely expected to hit the market within a year. [Antone Gonsalves]