SBIR-STTR Award

Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) promises much better communications quality, throughput, and robustness for cognitive radios sharing spectrum with other (e.g., primary) users. Effective DSA radios will identify any “spectrum space” opportunities that can opportunistically be exploited for communications. For purposes of identifying unused spectrum space, it is well known that cyclostationary processing approaches offer an order of magnitude performance advantage compared against conventional approaches such as energy detection. However, cyclostationary methods are seldom used in practice, especially on low-processing capable, software defined radio (SDR) platforms, due to the implementation complexity and high power consumption required using conventional radio designs. ORB Analytics proposes algorithmic and implementation innovations, including a reduced search space cyclostationary processor and ASIC-based FFT accelerator, that can make cyclostationary processing practical even on radios with low size, weight and power (SWaP) such as those envisioned for DSA.

Keywords:
Jtrs, Dsa, Cognitive Radio, Opportunistic Spectral Access, Cyclostationary Processing, Feature Detection, Energy Detection

Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) promises much better communications quality and throughput for cognitive radios sharing spectrum with primary users. The most effective DSA radios will use spectrum sensing to identify any opportunities for communications. For purposes of identifying spectrum holes, it is well known that cyclostationary processing approaches offer an order of magnitude performance advantage compared against conventional approaches such as energy detection. However, cyclostationary methods are seldom used in practice due to the implementation complexity. In Phase I, ORB Analytics demonstrated on an FPGA a reduced complexity cyclostationary processor capable of detecting WiFi and WiMAX signals at -10 dB SNR. In Phase II, ORB Analytics will enhance the RTL models for a cyclostationary processing based spectrum sensor that will be integrated on BAE Systems DSA radios and field tested to verify performance against a wide range of waveforms. ORB Analytics' design will be JTRS SCA API-compliant and support porting to DSA-enabled platforms.

Keywords:
Jtrs, Dsa, Cognitive Radio, Opportunistic Spectral Access, Cyclostationary Processing, Feature Detection, Energy Detection