PROBABILITY OF ERROR IN FREQUENCY-HOP SPREAD-SPECTRUM MULTIPLE-ACCESS COMMUNICATION-SYSTEMS WITH NONCOHERENT RECEPTION

In this paper we develop expressions for the probability of error for asynchronous frequency-hop spread-spectrum multiple-access networks using Markov hopping patterns and binary frequency shift keying with one symbol transmitted per hop. The expressions are exact when there is one interfering user and orthogonal BFSK employed. They provide excellent approximations when there are more than one interfering user. The model employed takes into account the random phases, random data bits and accounts for the effects due to random delays of the interfering signals. The model also incorporates a finite number of different power levels in the network at the intended receiver. It is also shown thai the error probability when Markov hopping patterns are employed is a good approximation to the error probability when memoryless hopping patterns are employed. Finally, by computing the channel capacity and the associated throughput, a simple hard decisions receiver is shown to perform much better than a receiver using perfect side-information to erase the symbols transmitted on hops that were hit when all the users have same power and one binary symbol is transmitted per hop.