A Review of the Role of Surface Reflection in Multipath Propagation over Terrestrial Microwave Links

Abstract

It has long been recognized that surface reflection on overwater microwave radio relay paths plays an important role in causing frequency selective multipath fading. However, there has been a tendency among many radio scientists and engineers to assume that similar but less prevalent fading on most overland paths arose mainly from multiple paths through the atmosphere. With the introduction of wide-band digital radio into microwave relay networks, the origin of selective fading has been investigated with renewed interest because of the damaging effects of distortion. There is mounting experimental and theoretical evidence that ground reflection and scattering has an important role in producing much of the selective multipath propagation effects on overland links. This paper reviews both old and new evidence, providing some new insights into the complex mixture of mechanisms involved. Some resulting implications for the design of digital radio links are also discussed.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Nov 01, 1987
Accession Number
ADP005732

Entities

People

  • L. Peter Martin
  • Roderic L. Olsen
  • Terje Tjelta

Organizations

  • Communications Research Centre Canada

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Bandwidth
  • Communication Systems
  • Complex Mixtures
  • Databases
  • Diffraction
  • Diffuse Reflection
  • Fresnel Zones
  • Information Science
  • Low Angles
  • Nato
  • Radio Equipment
  • Radio Links
  • Ray Tracing
  • Regression Analysis
  • Scattering
  • Statistical Analysis
  • Surface Roughness

Readers

  • Radio communications and signal processing.
  • Spectroscopy.
  • Theoretical Analysis.