
Chapter 14
Project 5: AM Receivers
14.1 Theory
A
MPLITUDE modulation (AM) is a very popular modulation scheme. As we discussed
in Chapter 13, AM signals are carried in the envelope of the carrier signal. An AM
signal with carrier frequency, f
c
= 550 kHz, message frequency, f
msg
= 5 kHz, and modu-
lation index, μ =0.8, is shown in Figure 14.1. In this figure, the signal’s envelope is clearly
sinusoidal. Counting the envelope variations shows that the signal envelope experiences five
periods in the displayed time duration of 1 millisecond. The message frequency can now be
verified to be, f
msg
=5/0.001 = 5 kHz. Since the carrier is displayed as solid shading