The applications of wireless communications and digital signal processing have dramatically changed the way we live, work, and learn over decades. The requirement of higher throughput and ubiquitous connectivity for wireless communication systems has become prevalent nowadays. Signal sensing, detection and estimation have been prevalent in signal processing and communications for many years. The relevant studies deal with the processing of information-bearing signals for the purpose of information extraction. Nevertheless, new robust and efficient signal sensing, detection and estimation techniques are still in demand since there emerge more and more practical applications which rely on them. In this dissertation work, we proposed several novel signal sensing, detection and estimation schemes for wireless communications applications, such as spectrum sensing, symbol-detection/channel-estimation, and encoder identification. The associated theories and practice in robustness, computational complexity, and overall system performance evaluation are also provided
