Regulatory and Policy Implications of Emerging Technologies to Spectrum Management

This paper provides an overview of the policy implications of technological developments, and how these technologies can accommodate an increased level of market competition. It is based on the work carried out in the SPORT VIEWS (Spectrum Policies and Radio Technologies Viable In Emerging Wireless Societies) research project for the European Commission (FP6)spectrum, new radio technologies, UWB, SDR, cognitive radio, Telecommunications, regulation, Networks, Interconnection

Emerging Technologies and Access to Spectrum Resources: the Case of Short-Range Systems

Traditional regulatory arrangements have constrained access to radio frequency spectrum. This has resulted in artificial scarcity of spectrum. The paper addresses the issue of whether technological developments in short-range systems (e.g. cognitive radios and ultra wideband) might promote access to spectrum - possibly using market mechanisms such as trading - and reduce spectrum shortages.spectrum policy, spectrum access, emerging spectrum-using technology, Telecommunications, regulation, infrastructure

A comprehensive survey of wireless body area networks on PHY, MAC, and network layers solutions

Recent advances in microelectronics and integrated circuits, system-on-chip design, wireless communication and intelligent low-power sensors have allowed the realization of a Wireless Body Area Network (WBAN). A WBAN is a collection of low-power, miniaturized, invasive/non-invasive lightweight wireless sensor nodes that monitor the human body functions and the surrounding environment. In addition, it supports a number of innovative and interesting applications such as ubiquitous healthcare, entertainment, interactive gaming, and military applications. In this paper, the fundamental mechanisms of WBAN including architecture and topology, wireless implant communication, low-power Medium Access Control (MAC) and routing protocols are reviewed. A comprehensive study of the proposed technologies for WBAN at Physical (PHY), MAC, and Network layers is presented and many useful solutions are discussed for each layer. Finally, numerous WBAN applications are highlighted

MH-REACH-Mote: supporting multi-hop passive radio wake-up for wireless sensor network

A passive wake-up radio in a wireless sensor network (WSN) has the advantage of increasing network lifetime by using a wake-up radio receiver (WuRx) to eliminate unnecessary idle listening. A sensor node equipped with a WuRx can operate in an ultra-low-power sleep mode, waiting for a trigger signal sent by the wake-up radio transmitter (WuTx). The passive WuRx is entirely powered by the energy harvested from radio transmissions sent by the WuTx. Therefore, it has the advantage of not consuming any energy locally, which would drain the sensor node's battery. Even so, the high amount of energy required to wake up a passive WuRx by a WuTx makes it difficult to build a multi-hop passive wake-up sensor network. In this paper, we describe and discuss our implementation of a battery-powered sensor node with multi-hop wake-up capability using passive WuRxs, called MH-REACH-Mote (Multi-hop-Range EnhAnCing energy Harvester-Mote). The MH-REACH-Mote is kept in an ultra-low-power sleep mode until it receives a wake-up trigger signal. Upon receipt, it wakes up and transmits a new trigger signal to power other passive WuRxs. We evaluate the wake-up range and power consumption of an MH-REACH-Mote through a series of field tests. Results show that the MH-REACH-Mote enables multi-hop wake-up capabilities for passive WuRxs with a wake-up range of 9.4m while requiring a reasonable power consumption for WuTx functionality. We also simulate WSN data collection scenarios with MH-REACH-Motes and compare the results with those of active wake-up sensor nodes as well as a low power listening approach. The results show that the MH-REACH-Mote enables a longer overall lifetime than the other two approaches when data is collected infrequently.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Synchronization in wireless communications

The last decade has witnessed an immense increase of wireless communications services in order to keep pace with the ever increasing demand for higher data rates combined with higher mobility. To satisfy this demand for higher data rates, the throughput over the existing transmission media had to be increased. Several techniques were proposed to boost up the data rate: multicarrier systems to combat selective fading, ultra wide band (UWB) communications systems to share the spectrum with other users, MIMO transmissions to increase the capacity of wireless links, iteratively decodable codes (e.g., turbo codes and LDPC codes) to improve the quality of the link, cognitive radios, and so forth