Overview Of Calculating System Minimum Detectable Signal

There are a wide range of applications for which it is desirable or necessary to know the minimum power level at which a system receiver can detect an incoming signal. Because the minimum detectable signal (MDS) also pertains to the noise floor of system receiver, this is of particular import when the received power level may be close to the MDS. Knowledge of the MDS is also necessary when calculating the dynamic range or signal to noise ratio for a particular receiver configuration. The following treatment outlines a straightforward method to derive the MDS.