A transmission medium is a material substance (solid, liquid, gas, or plasma)

that can propagate energy waves. For example, the transmission medium for
sounds is usually air, but solids and liquids may also act as transmission
media for sound.
The absence of a material medium in vacuum may also constitute a
transmission medium for electromagnetic waves such as light and radio
waves. hile material substance is not required for electromagnetic waves to
propagate, such waves are usually a!ected by the transmission media they
pass through, for instance by absorption or by re"ection or refraction at the
interfaces between media.
The term transmission medium also refers to a technical device that employs
the material substance to transmit or guide waves. Thus, an optical #ber or a
copper cable is a transmission medium. $ot only this but also is able to guide
the transmission of networ%s.
A transmission medium can be classi#ed as a&
'inear medium, if di!erent waves at any particular point in the medium can
be superposed(
)ounded medium, if it is #nite in extent, otherwise unbounded medium(
*niform medium or homogeneous medium, if its physical properties are
unchanged at di!erent points(
+sotropic medium, if its physical properties are the same in di!erent
directions.
,oaxial cable, one example of a transmission medium
-lectromagnetic radiation can be transmitted through an optical medium,
such as optical #ber, or through twisted pair wires, coaxial cable, or
dielectric.slab waveguides. +t may also pass through any physical material
that is transparent to the speci#c wavelength, such as water, air, glass, or
concrete. /ound is, by de#nition, the vibration of matter, so it requires a
physical medium for transmission, as do other %inds of mechanical waves and
heat energy. 0istorically, science incorporated various aether theories to
explain the transmission medium. 0owever, it is now %nown that
electromagnetic waves do not require a physical transmission medium, and
so can travel through the 1vacuum1 of free space. 2egions of the insulative
vacuum can become conductive for electrical conduction through the
presence of free electrons, holes, or ions.
Transmission and reception of data is performed in four steps.
The data is coded as binary numbers at the sender end
A carrier signal is modulated as speci#ed by the binary representation of the
data
At the receiving end, the incoming signal is demodulated into the respective
binary numbers
3ecoding of the binary numbers is performed456
Telecommunications4edit6
A physical medium in data communications is the transmission path over
which a signal propagates.
7any transmission media are used as communications channel.
For telecommunications purposes in the *nited /tates, Federal /tandard
589:,, transmission media are classi#ed as one of the following&
;uided (or bounded)<waves are guided along a solid medium such as a
transmission line.
ireless (or unguided)<transmission and reception are achieved by means of
an antenna.
=ne of the most common physical medias used in networ%ing is copper wire.
,opper wire to carry signals to long distances using relatively low amounts of
power. The unshielded twisted pair (*T>) is eight strands of copper wire,
organi?ed into four pairs.4@6
Another example of a physical medium is optical #ber, which has emerged as
the most commonly used transmission medium for long.distance
communications. =ptical #ber is a thin strand of glass that guides light along
its length. Four maAor factors favor optical #ber over copper. data rates,
distance, installation, and costs. =ptical #ber can carry huge amounts of data
compared to copper. +t can be run for hundreds of miles without the need for
signal repeaters, in turn, reducing maintenance costs and improving the
reliability of the communication system because repeaters are a common
source of networ% failures. ;lass is lighter than copper allowing for less need
for speciali?ed heavy.lifting equipment when installing long.distance optical
#ber. =ptical #ber for indoor applications cost approximately a dollar a foot,
the same as copper.496
7ultimode and single mode are two types of commonly used optical #ber.
7ultimode #ber uses '-3s as the light source and can carry signals over
shorter distances, about @ %ilometers. /ingle mode can carry signals over
distances of tens of miles.
ireless media may carry surface waves or s%ywaves, either longitudinally or
transversely, and are so classi#ed.
+n both communications, communication is in the form of electromagnetic
waves. ith guided transmission media, the waves are guided along a
physical path( examples of guided media include phone lines, twisted pair
cables, coaxial cables, and optical #bers. *nguided transmission media are
methods that allow the transmission of data without the use of physical
means to de#ne the path it ta%es. -xamples of this include microwave, radio
or infrared. *nguided media provide a means for transmitting
electromagnetic waves but do not guide them( examples are propagation
through air, vacuum and seawater.
The term direct lin% is used to refer to the transmission path between two
devices in which signals propagate directly from transmitters to receivers
with no intermediate devices, other than ampli#ers or repeaters used to
increase signal strength. This term can apply to both guided and unguided
media.
A transmission may be simplex, half.duplex, or full.duplex.
+n simplex transmission, signals are transmitted in only one direction( one
station is a transmitter and the other is the receiver. +n the half.duplex
operation, both stations may transmit, but only one at a time. +n full duplex
operation, both stations may transmit simultaneously. +n the latter case, the
medium is carrying signals in both directions at same time.