access icon free Flexibility in over-the-air testing of receiver sensitivity with reverberation chambers

© US Government
Received 15/05/2019, Accepted 16/07/2019, Revised 03/07/2019, Published 18/07/2019

The next generation of wireless device utilises higher frequencies and a large array of form factors. With miniaturisation of devices and the growth of internet-of-things applications having no connectors for testing, the use of conducted tests is no longer an option and verification of this equipment requires over-the-air measurements. Additionally, some important metrics such as receiver sensitivity requires an actual communication link. Reverberation chambers loaded with lossy absorbers provide an efficient environment to measure such averaged quantities with flexibility in a test volume as well as device size, shape, and placement. Here, the authors present an overview of OTA measurements in reverberation chambers compared to anechoic measurements. The authors show the consistency and flexibility of reverberation chambers through measurements of a wireless device in three different reverberation chamber setups and compare to an anechoic chamber measurement. By using a proper chamber setup, and by showing a coherence bandwidth (CBW) as a universal metric for comparing chamber loading between setups, excellent chamber-to-chamber consistency is shown, without precise placement of the device in each chamber. The authors show empirical evidence for the choice of threshold in determining the CBW.

Inspec keywords: antenna testing; radio receivers; anechoic chambers (electromagnetic); reverberation chambers

Other keywords: wireless device; receiver sensitivity; Internet-of-Things; chamber loading; coherence bandwidth; anechoic measurements; reverberation chamber; anechoic chamber measurement; over-the-air testing; chamber-to-chamber consistency; communication link; over-the-air measurements; OTA measurements

Subjects: Electromagnetic compatibility and interference; Single antennas; Radio links and equipment

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