The Werkgemeenschap voor Informatie- en Communicatietheorie
in the Benelux organized the

MIDWINTER MEETING
on
WIRELESS COMMUNICATION

March 8, 2005

Einstein Auditorium, The Strip
High Tech Campus Eindhoven,
Eindhoven, The Netherlands

Organizing Committee:
- dr.ir. Stan Baggen, Philips Research
- dr.ir. Andries Hekstra, Philips Research
- dr.ir. Frans Willems, TU Eindhoven
Co-organized by the IEEE Benelux Chapter on Information Theory

HOSTED AND SPONSORED BY PHILIPS RESEARCH
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INTRODUCTION

The use and importance of wireless communication has steadily
increased over the last years. A society without mobile phones and
wireless LANs is hard to imagine today. For the future it is to be
expected that wireless links will have larger capacities and be even
more pervasive. Viewing a combination of links as a network will
become inevitable and lead to more reliable systems.

The midwinter meeting offered an overview of some recent developments
in wireless communication, presented by experts from both industry
and the academic world. The presentations have a tutorial
character and should be understandable for persons with a basic
knowledge of digital communication.

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PROGRAM

09:15 Registration
09:50 Welcome and Introduction
10:00 "An Overview of Ultra Wideband Communication"
      prof. Ian Opperman,
      Oulu University, Oulu, Finland
10:50 coffee break
11:10 "RF Transceiver Front Ends"
      prof. Peter Baltus,
      Philips Semiconductors, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
12:00 lunch break
13:30 "Analog-to-Digital Converters in Communication Systems"
      dr.ir. Raf Roovers,
      Philips Research, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
14:20 "Flexible Radios: Making Flexibility Rhyme with Low Cost and Low Power"
      prof.dr.ir. Liesbet Van der Perre,
      IMEC, Louvain, Belgium
15:10 tea break
15:30 "MIMO OFDM for Wireless LANs"
      dr.ir. Allert van Zelst,
      Airgo Networks, Breukelen, The Netherlands.
16:20 Closing
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ABSTRACTS of PRESENTATIONS:

Peter Baltus: "RF Tranceiver Front Ends"
The complexity, in terms of component count, of a typical RF
transceiver front end is very small when compared to the digital
circuits in modern communication systems. However, the impact of the
RF transceiver front end on performance, power dissipation, cost and
size is significant.
This presentation will focus on the background of these transceiver
front end properties, and the consequences for systems with multiple
antennas.

Raf Roovers: "Analog-to-Digital Converters in Communication Systems"
The presentation will elaborate on the role of analog-to-digital
conversion in communications. Increasing data-rates and further
digitizing of the signal processing in receivers has a severe impact
on the power requirements of the analog-t0-digital converters. The
trade-off's will be discussed and illustrated with some examples.

Ian Opperman: "An Overview of Ultra Wideband Communication"
Ultra wideband (UWB) communication shows a great deal of promise for
short range, high data rate communications. UWB also has signal
properties which make it well suited for location and tracking
scenarios. The presentation will address the basics of the UWB
physical layer, signal structure and some of the unique features of
UWB which make it suitable for use in short range systems with
location and tracking.

Liesbet Van der Perre: "Flexible Radios: Making Flexibility Rhyme
with Low Cost and Low Power"
The query for ubiquitous broadband wireless communication bringing
multimedia services is yet not available. One of the major
bottlenecks is the need for flexible radios that can adapt to the
link and the QoS demands. Moreover, those flexible radios should come
with low cost and minimal power consumption. Today, new opportunities
pave the way for flexible radios: The evolution of technology for the
low cost realization of software defined radios as the physical
engine, while an intelligent driver will optimize the
performance-power for the user.

Allert van Zelst: "MIMO OFDM for Wireless LANs"
The concept of Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) communication is
explained by an intuitive physical interpretation. The combination of
MIMO and OFDM is described followed by its application to Wireless
LANs. An overview of the proposals in the IEEE 802.11n
standardization body is given. Finally, a MIMO OFDM WLAN product is
demonstrated.