Antenna Types, Wireless Network Protocols, And Software-Defined Wireless Network Architecture

Strengths and Weaknesses of Yagi, Horn Cellular and New Digital Antennas

1. Strengths and Weaknesses of Yagi, Horn Cellular and New Digital Antennas

1. i) Yagi Antenna: This is the directional antenna, which consists of some of the parallel elements in one single line or half-waved dipoles that are made from the metal rods. Yagi antenna is made up of the element that is single driven and is connected to the transmitter and the receiver (Lu et al., 2015). This kind of antenna is used as a high-gained antenna on high frequency, very high frequency and ultra high frequency bands.

The major strengths of these Yagi antennas are given below:

1. a) Wide Bandwidth: The first strength of this Yagi antenna is that it provides wide bandwidth because of the folded dipoles.
2. b) Cost Effectiveness: This type of antenna is extremely cost effective and hence does not incur huge costs.
3. c) Compact Size: Another important advantage of Yagi is its compact size, thus, the weight is light (Rangan, Rappaport & Erkip, 2014).

The major weaknesses of the Yagi antennas are given below:

1. a) No High Gain: This antenna cannot provide the higher gain and hence the maximum limit is only until 7 dB.
2. b) Sensitiveness of Frequency: Yagi antenna has frequency sensitiveness. Moreover, its design is obstructive. 

1. ii) Horn Antenna: Horn antenna consists of the flaring metal waveguide, which is eventually shaped as any specific horn to direct few of radio waves in one beam. These horns can be used as typical antennas at the microwave frequency and ultra higher frequency or UHF. The range is more than 300MHz (Ghosh et al., 2014). This type of antenna is used as the feed antenna for the parabolic antenna. The range of bandwidth of horn antenna is from 0.8GHz to 18GHz.

The strengths of the horn antennas are given below:

1. a) High Gain: As horn antenna consists of parabolic reflector disc, high gain is provided by it.
2. b) Simple Construction: The structure of horn antenna is absolutely simplified and thus is quite popular.
3. c) Directivity: This particular antenna eventually delivers adequate directivity (Ngai & Rodhe, 2013).

The weaknesses of horn antenna are given below:

1. a) Larger Length: Since, the gain of the horn antennas is limited to less than 20dB, this gain, whenever increases, subsequently increases the length of horn to a great extent.
2. b) No Directive Beam: As horn antenna radiates energy within the shape of sphere wave, no directive or sharp beam is being provided. 

iii) Cellular Antennas: The specific kind of network, where the end link is wireless is termed as cellular antenna. Cellular network is distributed on land areas and each one of these is termed as cell, which is subsequently served by any one transceiver (Azharuddin & Jana, 2015). These cellular antennas can be used as the networks of mobile phones.

The major strengths of the cellular antenna are given below:

1. a) Data and Voiced Services: The first benefit of cellular antenna is that it provides data as well as voice services even within roaming.
2. b) Easy Up Gradation: The cellular antenna can be easily upgraded without much complexities and the maintenance is also easy (Jing et al., 2014).
3. c) Connection with Wireless Telephones: Cellular antenna has the ability to connect to the wireless as well as fixed telephones.

The weaknesses of cellular antenna are given below:

1. a) Higher Costs: The total cost of implementing cellular network is quite high than other antennas.
2. b) Limited Amount of Data: Cellular antenna provides limited amount of data to its users.

1. iv) New Digital Antenna: The fourth type of wireless antenna is the new digital antenna. It provides easy access to free television programming without any type of cable subscription. This is extremely popular for the metropolitan cities (Al-Imari et al., 2014). However, even in the suburbs, the antenna provides better television programming.

The strengths of new digital antenna are given below:

1. a) Cost Effective: This antenna is extremely cost effective and hence could be afforded by all.
2. b) Allows Channel Selection: This particular antenna allows its users to select the channels, they are wishing to watch.
3. c) Easy Installation: New digital antenna could be easily installed without any type of complexity (Rangan, Rappaport & Erkip, 2014).

The weaknesses of this antenna are given below:

1. a) No Premium Channel: This antenna does not provide any premium channel.
2. b) Distorted Signal: Often the signal gets distorted due to rain or any other change in weather.

The significant dominant player of the medium as well as longer distance wireless network in future will be the new digitalized antenna. This is mainly because this antenna is very portable and could be used by any user and the installation is also very easy. The new digital antenna can be termed as cost effective with an extensible bandwidth (Ghosh et al., 2014). Due to this benefit, it can work easily in UHF and VHF bands.

2. Three Different Wireless Network Protocols with Strengths and Weaknesses

There are three specific protocols of wireless network, which are very famous, are given below:

1. i) LTE: Long Termed Evolution or simply LTE can be defined as the typical standard for any higher speed communication that is wireless. This standard is being used within mobile devices or data terminals based on EDGE as well as GSM technology (Ngai & Rodhe, 2013). The LTE gradually increments the capacity and speed by separating the radio interfaces and network improvements. The 4G LTE as well as the advanced 4G are the recent versions of LTE.

The major strengths of the LTE are given below:

1. a) Low Time Consumption: The most important advantage of LTE network protocol is that the time consumption is very less.
2. b) Higher Rate of Data Transmission: The data transmission rate is higher in LTE protocol.
3. c) Low Latency: LTE has lower latency than other network protocols (Azharuddin & Jana, 2015).

The major weaknesses of the LTE are given below:

1. a) Expensive: LTE is much expensive and the speed is higher.
2. b) Complex Structure: The architecture of LTE protocol is complex and thus the overall maintenance is not easy.

The main security challenge in LTE is authentication. Often data is hacked by the attackers and for this issue; a ciphering algorithm is implemented in it. The second issue is insecure key of AKA (Agiwal, Roy & Saxena, 2016). Hence, an EAP AKA is implemented in the architecture.

1. ii) Bluetooth: The second wireless network protocol is Bluetooth, where data is transmitted in a short distance. The total range of wavelength of Bluetooth is between 2.4GHz to 2.485GHz (Yang et al., 2015). The speed of this protocol is pretty high for any data transmission.

The major strengths of Bluetooth are given below:

1. a) High Speed: The total speed of this protocol is much high and thus data transmission is easy.
2. b) Cheaper: The cost of Bluetooth is extremely less and is easily affordable.
3. c) Easy Connectivity: Since, the power consumption is less, it could be easily connected to other devices (Jing et al., 2014).

The main weaknesses of Bluetooth are given below:

1. a) Lesser Security: Data is often hacked in Bluetooth and there is no security.
2. b) Lower Bandwidth: The range of data transmission is very less, since bandwidth is low.

The significant security issue is that there is no security to the data and thus is often hacked. Hence, it is often advised for not using Bluetooth to transfer any confidential data. The second issue is short distance (Rangan, Rappaport & Erkip, 2014). The range is only between 2.4GHz to 2.485GHz.

iii) WiFi: Another important protocol is wireless fidelity or WiFi. This network protocol is based on the standard of IEEE 802.11. The interoperability testing could be done easily and it could be used in smart TVs, laptops, smart phones, desktops and many others.

Three Different Wireless Network Protocols with Strengths and Weaknesses

The main strengths of WiFi are given below:

1. a) Faster: The transmission of data is much fast in WiFi (Al-Imari et al., 2014).
2. b) Cost Effectiveness: WiFi is not at all expensive and hence is affordable.
3. c) Easy Access: The access to this protocol is easier and hence is quite popular.

The main weaknesses of WiFi are given below:

1. a) No Security:The data has no security in WiFi and is often hacked.
2. b) Requires Additional Software: WiFi requires additional software before it is being installed or implemented (Azharuddin & Jana, 2015).

The major security challenge of WiFi is the lack of security of data. Thus, passwords are provided for every user and the passwords are changed periodically. 

3. Reflection of Paper 1: “An Architecture for Software Defined Wireless Networking”

Software defined networking or SDN facilitates any type of network management to allow the efficient as well as effective network configuration. This helps in improving the network monitoring or performances. SDN thus addresses static architectures and finally the network intelligence can be centralized. There is disassociation in the forward procedure of data plane and this is completed from control plane (Bernardos et al., 2014). Control plane and data plane are then separated by the wired networking. Thus, SDN helps the other network operators in running the infrastructures with better efficiency or effectiveness. The newer services could be easily deployed when the virtualization characteristics are allowed.

The SDN approach is eventually applied to wireless mobile networks and hence it provides better features than wired network. Moreover, leverage is brought within these features to enhance improvements. The SDN referred architecture is proposed in this article for describing the centralized intelligence in the controller that is software-based and has the core capability for device controlling (Bernardos et al., 2014). CAPWAP protocol then centralizes wireless network management. The second SDN architecture is the SDWN that given better interfaces for control plane functionalities and hence the handling of traffic is easier. The two architectures are much effective for any wireless mobile network.

Reflection of Paper 2: “Software Defined Wireless Networks: A Survey of Issues and Solutions”

SDN architecture helps to make the wireless network more flexible and agile. The network control can be improved by allowing these service providers to respond quickly and hence changing the various requirements (Rangisetti & Tamma, 2017). The SDN controller then directs all switches to deliver the network services when there is lack of connectivity between service and device. These wireless networks consist of the inflexible network infrastructure and thus there are various challenges to handle traffic. The mobile network operators or MNOs make network control simpler and the solution deployment is fast in hardware.

The SDN makes network agile and flexible after separating the data plane and control plane. LTE mobile network is then implemented by network services. NFV or network function virtualization can handle control signal with more efficiency and the traffics could be controlled. Furthermore, NFV and SDN make the network service platforms flexible, scalable and adaptable when inflexible middle boxes are replaced (Rangisetti & Tamma, 2017). The mobile edge computing or MEC platform can bring cloud computing and IT service only by offering network solutions. Various issues such as frequency or handover with their proper solutions are described here. 

References

Agiwal, M., Roy, A., & Saxena, N. (2016). Next generation 5G wireless networks: A comprehensive survey. IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials, 18(3), 1617-1655.

Al-Imari, M., Xiao, P., Imran, M. A., & Tafazolli, R. (2014, August). Uplink non-orthogonal multiple access for 5G wireless networks. In Wireless Communications Systems (ISWCS), 2014 11th International Symposium on (pp. 781-785). IEEE.

Azharuddin, M., & Jana, P. K. (2015). A distributed algorithm for energy efficient and fault tolerant routing in wireless sensor networks. Wireless Networks, 21(1), 251-267.

Bernardos, C. J., De La Oliva, A., Serrano, P., Banchs, A., Contreras, L. M., Jin, H., & Zúñiga, J. C. (2014). An architecture for software defined wireless networking. IEEE wireless communications, 21(3), 52-61.

ElSawy, H., Hossain, E., & Haenggi, M. (2013). Stochastic geometry for modeling, analysis, and design of multi-tier and cognitive cellular wireless networks: A survey. IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials, 15(3), 996-1019.

Ghosh, A., Thomas, T. A., Cudak, M. C., Ratasuk, R., Moorut, P., Vook, F. W., … & Nie, S. (2014). Millimeter-wave enhanced local area systems: A high-data-rate approach for future wireless networks. IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, 32(6), 1152-1163.

Jing, Q., Vasilakos, A. V., Wan, J., Lu, J., & Qiu, D. (2014). Security of the Internet of Things: perspectives and challenges. Wireless Networks, 20(8), 2481-2501.

Lu, X., Wang, P., Niyato, D., Kim, D. I., & Han, Z. (2015). Wireless networks with RF energy harvesting: A contemporary survey. IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials, 17(2), 757-789.

Ngai, E. C. H., & Rodhe, I. (2013). On providing location privacy for mobile sinks in wireless sensor networks. Wireless networks, 19(1), 115-130.

Rangan, S., Rappaport, T. S., & Erkip, E. (2014). Millimeter-wave cellular wireless networks: Potentials and challenges. Proceedings of the IEEE, 102(3), 366-385.

Rangisetti, A. K., & Tamma, B. R. (2017). Software Defined Wireless Networks: A Survey of Issues and Solutions. Wireless Personal Communications, 97(4), 6019-6053.

Yang, M., Li, Y., Jin, D., Zeng, L., Wu, X., & Vasilakos, A. V. (2015). Software-defined and virtualized future mobile and wireless networks: A survey. Mobile Networks and Applications, 20(1), 4-18.