Preliminary results of an ultra-wideband (impulse) scanning receiver

Time modulated ultra-wideband (TM-UWB) techniques allow the transmission and fully coherent reception of RF signals with very large fractional bandwidths for a wide variety of important applications. However, traditional instrumentation (e.g., spectrum analyzers) cannot be used at meaningful distances to measure the channel response for such signals. Without such measurements it has been impossible to create channel models except in a few simple cases. Now a TM-UWB scanning receiver has been constructed that allows precision measurement of the impulse response of the channel where measurements can be made out to the maximum communications range of the system. This versatile system not only captures ultra-wideband propagation waveforms, but information on data symbol statistics. The data collected from this measurement instrument can be used to create channel models, guide selection of locking algorithms, characterize noise, analyze error correction techniques, and eventually study geo-ranging capabilities. Preliminary measurement results are presented for an in-building environment. Results include the value of coherent RAKE combining.