Spectrum Occupancy Information in Support of Adaptive Spectrum Sensing for Cognitive Radio

Abstract

Cognitive radio (CR) is an emerging solution to spectrum scarcity currently faced worldwide as CR can change its operating parameters like frequency and bandwidth according to the radio environment and provides efficient spectrum utilisation. Many measurement campaigns conducted around the world showed that the licensed spectrum is not efficiently utilized which led to the need of implementation of dynamic spectrum access (DSA). Statistical information about current frequency usage and its use for developing new algorithms and protocols for CR network is the research area that still requires much more effort. In this paper we discuss the comparison of measurement results obtained from two measurement campaigns conducted in Pune at same location but with different total bandwidths considered. Further to implement CR the best suited channels are obtained from the data collected by using adaptive sensing methods, reference, duty cycle, periodicity and Markov method. The results of spectrum sensing methods show that spectrum occupancy information play a vital role in sensing best suited channels for cognitive radio.