Digital Signal 1 (DS1, sometimes DS-1) is a T-carrier signaling scheme devised by Bell Labs. DS1 is the primary digital telephone standard used in the United States, Canada and Japan and is able to transmit up to 24 multiplexed voice and data calls over telephone lines. E-carrier is used in place of T-carrier outside the United States, Canada, Japan, and South Korea. DS1 is the logical bit pattern used over a physical T1 line; in practice, the terms DS1 and T1 are often used interchangeably. T1 refers to the primary digital telephone carrier system used in North America. T1 is one line type of the PCM T-carrier hierarchy. T1 describes the cabling, signal type, and signal regeneration requirements of the carrier system. The signal transmitted on a T1 line, referred to as the DS1 signal, consists of serial bits transmitted at the rate of 1.544 Mbit/s. The type of line code used is called Alternate Mark Inversion (AMI). Digital Signal Designation is the classification of digital bit rates in the digital multiplex hierarchy used in transport of telephone signals from one location to another. DS-1 is a communications protocol for multiplexing the bitstreams of up to 24 telephone calls, along with two special bits: a framing bit (for frame synchronization) and a maintenance-signaling bit, transmitted over a digital circuit called T1. T1's maximum data transmission rate is 1.544 megabits per second. A DS1 telecommunication circuit multiplexes 24 DS0s. The twenty-four DS0s sampled 8,000 times per second (one 8bit PCM sample from each DSO per DS1 frame) consume 1.536 Mbit/s of bandwidth. One framing bit adds 8 kbit/s of overhead, for a total of 1.544 Mbit/s, calculated as follows: DS1 is a full-duplex circuit, concurrently transmitting and receiving 1.544 Mbit/s. Synchronization in telecommunications Frame synchronization is necessary to identify the timeslots within each 24-channel frame. Synchronization takes place by allocating a framing, or 193rd, bit. This results in 8 kbit/s of framing data, for each DS1.