Toward spectrum sharing: opportunities and technical enablers

The vast increase in the number of mobile devices and their mobile traffic demands indicates the need for additional spectrum for cellular communications. Since it is not trivial to allocate exclusively new spectrum bands for cellular communications, it is imperative to improve the spectrum usage through new spectrum sharing mechanisms. This implies that the mobile network operators will have to cooperate and interact to cover the augmented traffic requirements. In this article we present a novel architectural framework that enables the mobile network operators and other spectrum license holders to exchange information about spectrum availability. We also present a novel spectrum sharing mechanism based on fuzzy logic to facilitate operators in selecting the most suitable spectrum to cover their needs.