Spectrum and Energy Harvesting Wireless Networks

This chapter provides some insights for future research in green powered dynamic spectrum access‐based CR networks, which are capable of liberating wireless access networks from spectral and energy constraints. It introduces the functionalities of energy efficient spectrum harvesting networks. FreeNet relies on spectrum harvesting techniques to dynamically utilize the spectrum. Thus, spectrum sensing and sharing is essential to FreeNet. Unlike traditional CR networks, FreeNet is powered by renewable energy. Therefore, the spectrum sensing and sharing scheme for FreeNet should be optimized according to the dynamics of renewable energy. The chapter presents optimal operation strategies for adapting the architecture of access networks, managing network resources, and scheduling traffic for FreeNet. It also briefly analyzes the related research issues on network architecture optimization, network resource management, and context aware traffic scheduling. These discussions shed light on designing and optimizing future spectrum and energy efficient wireless networks.