TDMA-based cooperative sensing using SDR platform for cognitive radio

The current trend and demand of wireless services requires more efficient spectrum usage. With Cognitive Radio (CR) technology, spectrum efficiency will be increased by exploiting unused licensed or primary users spectrum. Spectrum sensing mechanism is one of the main cores in CR system. To combat the problems of shadowing, multipath fading, and hidden nodes, cooperative spectrum sensing has been proposed. Testbed prototyping for sensing is a challenging task. The demand for cooperative sensing to solve the above mentioned problems leads to proposals of PHY and MAC layer solutions. Therefore, in this paper, we demonstrate an experimental platform using USRP board that can facilitate the development of PHY and MAC layers functionality for cooperative spectrum sensing. In this paper, TDMA-based MAC protocol for cooperative sensing mechanism is proposed. The observation of the preliminary experimental measurement shows significant performance in term of feasibility of cooperative decision mechanism in wireless condition.