380 Hiiseyin Arslan otal ‘most common multiple access techniques that can be employed by OFDM. systems are TDMA, Carrier Sense Multiple Accessing (SMA) [4), Frequeney Division Multiple Accessing (FDMA), and CDMA based schemes [5]. In ad~ dition, a mix of TDMA and FDMA known as Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) (6) is also possible. Note that in the above sys- tem model, the interference from other users and other technologies (like co channel interference, adjacent channel interference, narrow band interference, ete.) are all folded into the noise term for the sake of simplicity. However, in reality, when the received signal is impaived by an interferer, a more accurate ‘model needs to be used, where the noise term will be colored effecting each cartier differently. 11.3 OFDM-Based Cognitive Radio Application of OFDM to cognitive radio brings about new aspects and chal- lenges to system design. The cognitive OFDM conceptual model considered in this chapter is shown in Figure 11.4%, The cognitive engine is responsible for making the intelligent decisions and configuring the radio and PHY para- meters. The spectral opportunities are identified by the decision unit based on the information from policy engine as well as local and network spectrum sensing data, The policy engine provides information to the cognitive engine concerning the current policies to be considered depending on the system location. This will ensure that the cognitive radio will not use ilegal waveforms or breach ‘any policies. On the other hand, the local spectrum sensing unit process the spectrum information and identily licensed users accessing the spectrum, their signal specifications such as the their bandwidth and power level, and detect, spectrum opportunities that can be exploited by coguitive radio. Once the required information is available, the decision unit can make a conclusion on the best course of action for the system. The decision includes choosing the appropriate channel coding, modulation, operation frequencies and bandwidth. At this stage, ODM technology gets the upper hand over other similar transmission technologies with its adaptive features and great flexibility. By only changing the configuration parameters of OFDM (see ‘Table 1.1 for some example parameters) and radio, the cognitive system ean communicate with various radio access technologies in the environment, oF it can optimize the transmission depending on the environmental characteristics. ‘The radio cixeuit is divided into a digital part (digital IP, ADC. and DAC) ‘and an analog part (software tunable analog radio). Both parts are reconfig- turable by the cognitive engine to inerease the flexibility of the system. This includes controlling the operating frequency, bandwidth, filters, and mixers. Even antenna parameters (e.g. number of antennas, beam forming) can be configured to improve the system performance T Some OFDM functions are skipped or simplified in order to keep the figure simple.11 OFDM for Cognitive Radio: Merits and Challenges 331 Fig. 11.4. OFDM-based Cognitive radio system block diagram. All of the layers ccan interact with the Cognitive engine. OFDM parameters and radio are configured by the Cognitive engine. ‘Table 11.1. OFDM-based wireless standards. Standard BEE. IEEE DVB-T 802.11(a/z) 802.22 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, om 2 26 TE BO, ois aap va ihnotise —Serale te ia Lake hake ake ako 1 Vente aa Bei ay ise ans Meemine MA Pawan —_S/A 11.4 Why OFDM is a Good Fit for Cognitive Radio ‘The underlying sensing and spectrum shaping capabilities together with flex- ibility and adaptiveness make OFDM probably the best candidate for cog- nitive radio systems. In the following, we present some of the requirements32 Hiseyin Arslan et al for cognitive radios and explain how OFDM can fulfill these requirements. A summary of these requirements and OFDM’s strength in addressing ther presented in Table 11.2. 11.4.1 Spectrum Sensing and Awareness Cognitive radio should be able to scan the spectrum and measure different channel characteristics such as power availability, interference, and noise t perature (7). In addition, the system should be able to identify different users Signals in the spectrum and also identify if they are either lensed or rental users. These abilities allow cognitive radio system to identify unused parts of the spectrum and spectral opportunities However, since for a rental system it is important not to interfere with other licensed systems using the spectrin, other measures should be taken to guarantee an interference-fzee communication between rental users. One approach is to share the spectrum sensing information between multiple cog- nitive radio deviees to deerease or even eliminate the probability of with licensed users [8]. On the other hand, more sophisticated algorithms ean be used for sensing the spectrum: ference ‘Table 11.2. OFDM cognitive radio “Cognitive radio OFDM'sstrength requirements Inherent FFT operation of OFDM eases spectrum se spectrum sensing Seney dopa ‘Waveform can be easily shaped by simply turning off some subcarriers, where primary users exist ‘OFDM systems can be adapted to different transmis environments and available resources. Some parameters include: FFT size, subcarrier spacing, CP size, modula- Adaptation Scalability tion, coding, subcarrier powers MultipleTnpat Mfultiple-Output (MIMO) techniques are Advanced antenna cotnmonly used with OFDM mainly because of the techniques reduced equalizer complexity. OFDM also supports smart antennas With WLAN (IRE 902.11), WMAN (IEEE 902.10) WRAN (IBEE 802.22), WPAN (IEEE 802.15.8a) all using OFDM as their PHY techniques, interoperability becomes ¢ to other technolog Interoperability ‘Support for m dy inherited in the system design by assigning groups of subearriers to dif- ferent users (OFDMA), Multiple accessing and spectral allocation NDI immunity NBI affect only some subcarriers in OFDM systems ‘Those subcarriers can be simply turned off