Resilience of QPSK Radio Links Under Narrowband and Broadband Electromagnetic Interferences

Electromagnetic interference has the potential to affect the functionality and performance of radio communication links. This work investigates the impact electromagnetic disturbances have on such wireless links, taking quadrature phase-shift keying (QPSK) as a representative example. The evaluation of the effects of interference on a QPSK radio link becomes relevant as it is used by the IEEE 802.11b protocol. Through simulations, we study a QPSK link subjected to narrowband and broadband disturbances. The bit error rate (BER) and the error vector magnitude (EVM) are our quality assessment metrics for evaluating the system. Two specific scenarios are analyzed: continuous wave and chirp interferences as in-band and out-band conditions. The results indicate that the applied electromagnetic interference can degrade the signal quality, resulting in high BER. Furthermore, it is observed that chirp interference largely affects the radio links more than continuous wave disturbances. The aforementioned findings support and reinforce the applicability of the analysis methodology in real-life scenarios like those characterizing healthcare settings.