RADIO FREQUENCY ARCHITECTURE FOR SPECTRUM ACCESS NETWORKS

• US 20080207204A1
• Filed: 02/21/2008
• Published: 08/28/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 02/22/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: STMicroelectronics Incorporated (STMicroelectronics NV)
• Original Assignee: STMicroelectronics Incorporated (STMicroelectronics NV)
• Inventors: Vlantis, George A., Hu, Wendong
• Granted Patent: US 8,437,314 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/435.2
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/28 the receiver comprising at least one semiconductor device having three or more electrodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/40 Circuits
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/00 Wireless channel access
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/10 Small scale networks; Flat hierarchical networks

Abstract

Radio frequency (RF) architectures for spectrum access networks are provided. Embodiments of the invention generally provide a radio frequency (RF) architecture for customer premise equipment (CPE) for use in, for example, IEEE 802.22 wireless regional area networks (WRANs). In some embodiments, the CPE RF architecture includes two receive chains with a directional antenna and an omni-directional antenna, respectively. The CPE RF architecture facilitates opportunistic out-of-band spectrum sensing and WRAN signal receiving that are performed in parallel with data transmission.

Claims

1. An out-of-band sensing circuit, comprising:

a sensing antenna;

a pre-selective filter coupled to the sensing antenna;

a low noise amplifier coupled to the pre-selective filter;

a mixer coupled to the low noise amplifier;

a local oscillator coupled to the mixer;

a channel filter coupled to the mixer;

a wireless regional area network (WRAN) synchronization module coupled to the channel filter; and

a sensing scheme module coupled to the channel filter.

2. The circuit of claim 1, wherein the sensing scheme module is capable of performing a spectrum sensing function on any signal type from a variety of different devices including at least one of an energy detector, a picture detector, a correlated detector, a part 74 detector, a TG1 Beacon detector.

3. A wireless regional area network (WRAN) signal receiving circuit, comprising:

an antenna;

a radio frequency (RF) switch coupled to the antenna;

a pre-selective filter coupled to the RF switch;

a low noise amplifier coupled to the pre-selective filter;

a mixer coupled to the low noise amplifier;

a local oscillator coupled to the mixer;

a channel filter coupled to the mixer; and

a WRAN synchronization demodulator decoder coupled to the channel filter.

4. The circuit of claim 3, wherein the antenna is a WRAN operating transceiver (TX/RX) antenna.

5. The circuit of claim 3, further comprising:

a WRAN encoding and modulation block;

a second mixer coupled to the WRAN encoding and modulation block and coupled to the local oscillator;

a high power amplifier (HPA) coupled to the second mixer; and

a selectable output filter coupled to the HPA and the pre-selective filter.

6. A wireless regional area network (WRAN) consumer premise equipment (CPE) radio frequency (RF) system, comprising:

an out-of-band sensing circuit capable of opportunistic out-band spectrum sensing; and

a WRAN signal receiving circuit capable of performing WRAN signal receiving in parallel with data transmission.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the out-of-band sensing circuit comprises:

a sensing antenna;

a pre-selective filter coupled to the sensing antenna;

a low noise amplifier coupled to the pre-selective filter;

a mixer coupled to the low noise amplifier;

a local oscillator coupled to the mixer;

a channel filter coupled to the mixer;

a WRAN synchronization module coupled to the channel filter; and

a sensing scheme module coupled to the channel filter.

8. The circuit of claim 7, wherein the sensing scheme module is capable of performing a spectrum sensing function on any signal type from a variety of different devices including at least one of an energy detector, a picture detector, a correlated detector, a part 74 detector, a TG1 Beacon detector.

9. The circuit of claim 7, wherein the WRAN signal receiving circuit comprises:

an antenna;

a RF switch coupled the antenna;

a pre-selective filter coupled to the RF switch;

a low noise amplifier coupled to the pre-selective filter;

a mixer coupled to the low noise amplifier;

a local oscillator coupled to the mixer;

a channel filter coupled to the mixer; and

a WRAN synchronization demodulator decoder coupled to the channel filter.

10. The circuit of claim 9, wherein the antenna is a WRAN operating transceiver (TX/RX) antenna.