Tone based congnitive radio for opportunistic communications

• US 20080311938A1
• Filed: 06/04/2008
• Published: 12/18/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 06/12/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sennet Communications
• Original Assignee: Sennet Communications
• Inventors: Song, Liang
• Granted Patent: US 8,599,789 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/500
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/382 for resource allocation, admission control or handover
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/04 Wireless resource allocation
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/00 Wireless channel access
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 74/06 using polling
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 76/10 Connection setup
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

Within both the licensed and unlicensed wireless spectrum, benefits are obtained in allowing devices to form and communicate based upon opportunistic spectrum availability. At present such ad-hoc networks are established using either directly existing Media Access Control protocols or proposing modifications to them. According to the invention, there is provided a method for allowing abstract wireless links, i.e., arbitrary cooperation among a set of proximite wireless nodes, to be established between devices in a fast and efficient manner. Beneficially the approach allows multi-standard cognitive radios to operate in ad-hoc environments and non-ad-hoc environments. Accordingly a wireless module monitors a plurality of sensing tones and polling tones, each pair of sensing and polling tones associated with a transmission channel. A wireless module determines a vacant transmission channel by the absence of both a sensing tone and its associated polling tone. An abstract wireless link could be established by the wireless module transmitting the polling tone associated with the vacant transmission channel and detecting from second other wireless modules the sensing tone associated with the vacant transmission channel.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

(a) providing a plurality of wireless modules;

each wireless module of the plurality of wireless modules operating according to a wireless standard;

(b) initiating an arbitrary cooperation between at least two of the plurality of wireless modules in proximity, the arbitrary cooperation established in dependence upon at least one of a sensing tone and a polling tone, the at least one of the sensing tone and the polling tone being associated with a channel according to the wireless standard.

2. A method according to claim 1 wherein;

providing the plurality of wireless modules operating according to a wireless standard comprises providing wireless modules capable of operating on a common plurality of frequencies, the common plurality of frequencies being a predetermined sub-set of possible operating frequencies of each module.

3. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

providing a wireless module according to the wireless standard comprises providing a wireless module operating according to at least the frequency plan of at least one of IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.15, IEEE 802.16, IEEE 802.20, UMTS, GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900, GPRS, ITU-R 5.138, ITU-R 5.150, ITU-R 5.280, and IMT-2000.

4. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

step (a) comprises providing wireless modules capable of at least one of monitoring and transmitting at least one of a sensing tone of a plurality of predetermined sensing tones and a polling tone of a plurality of predetermined polling tones, each sensing tone of the plurality of sensing tones and each polling tone of the plurality of polling tones being associated with a transmission channel according to the wireless standard.

5. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

step (a) comprises providing for each wireless module a wireless circuit in electrical communications with the wireless module, the wireless circuit capable of at least one of monitoring and transmitting at least one of a sensing tone of a plurality of predetermined sensing tones and a polling tone of a plurality of predetermined polling tones, each sensing tone of the plurality of sensing tones and each polling tone of the plurality of polling tones being associated with a transmission channel according to the wireless standard;

wherein, the wireless circuit provides at least signaling information to the wireless module as to which transmission channel the wireless module should be operating on.

6. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

step (b) comprises at least one of:

monitoring a predetermined subset of the plurality of sensing tones;

monitoring a predetermined subset of the plurality of polling tones;

determining a vacant transmission channel, the vacant transmission channel being determined in dependence of upon an absence of at least one of its associated sensing tone, its associated polling tone, and data transmission on the channel;

transmitting from a first wireless module of the plurality of wireless modules the polling tone associated with the vacant transmission channel;

detecting the polling tone associated with the vacant transmission channel at a second other wireless module; and

transmitting from the second other wireless module the sensing tone associated with the vacant transmission channel.

7. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

step (b) comprises establishing at least one of a unicast link, a multicast link, a broadcast link, an any-cast link, a unidirectional communication, and a bidirectional transmission between the at least two of the plurality of wireless modules.

8. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

at least one of the sensing tone and polling tone is an unmodulated signal, a CW frequency, a digital sequence, and a digital sequence containing information relating only to an identity of a channel of the wireless standard supporting data transmission.

9. A method according to claim 1 comprising:

(c) maintaining transmission of the polling tone and sensing tone for at least the duration of exchanging one data packet.

10. A method according to claim 9 comprising,

(d) terminating transmission of the polling tone upon completing the data packet;

and

(e) terminating transmission of the sensing tone upon completing the data packet.

11. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

the channel is provided according to at least one of Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access (OFDMA), Coded Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access, Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), Time Division Multiplexing (TDM), Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA), Frequency-Hopping Spread Spectrum (FHSS), and Direct-Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS).

12. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

step (a) comprises providing electronic modules supporting operation according to a media access control protocol of the wireless standard under first predetermined conditions and according to step (b) under second predetermined conditions.

13. A method comprising:

(a) providing a plurality of transmission channels, each transmission channel comprising at least a data channel and at least one of a sensing tone and a polling tone, the at least one of the sensing tone and polling tone being associated with the data channel;

(b) establishing communication between at least two wireless modules operating according to a wireless standard upon one transmission channel of the plurality of transmission channels in dependence upon at least one of the sensing tone and the polling tone associated with the one transmission channel of the plurality of transmission channels.

14. A method according to claim 13 wherein;

providing at least two wireless modules operating according to a wireless standard comprises providing wireless modules capable of operating on a common plurality of frequencies, the common plurality of frequencies being a sub-set of possible operating frequencies of each module.

15. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

providing a data channel comprises providing a data channel according to at least one of IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.15, IEEE 802.16, IEEE 802.20, UMTS, GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900, GPRS, ITU-R 5.138, ITU-R 5.150, ITU-R 5.280, and IMT-2000.

16. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

step (b) comprises providing wireless modules capable of at least one of monitoring and transmitting at least one of a sensing tone of a plurality of predetermined sensing tones and a polling tone of a plurality of predetermined polling tones, each sensing tone of the plurality of sensing tones and each polling tone of the plurality of polling tones being associated with a transmission channel according to the wireless standard, and transmitting data on the data channel associated with the one transmission channel of the plurality of transmission channels.

17. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

step (b) comprises providing for each wireless module a wireless circuit in electrical communications with the wireless module, the wireless circuit capable of at least one of monitoring and transmitting at least one of a sensing tone of a plurality of predetermined sensing tones and a polling tone of a plurality of predetermined polling tones, each sensing tone of the plurality of sensing tones and each polling tone of the plurality of polling tones being associated with a transmission channel according to the wireless standard;

wherein,

the wireless circuit provides at least signaling information to the wireless module as to which transmission channel the wireless module should be operating on.

18. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

step (b) comprises at least one of:

monitoring a predetermined subset of the plurality of sensing tones;

monitoring a predetermined subset of the plurality of polling tones;

determining a vacant transmission channel, the vacant transmission channel being determined in dependence upon an absence of at least one of its associated sensing tone, its associated polling tone and data transmission on the channel;

transmitting from a first wireless module of the plurality of wireless modules the polling tone associated with the vacant transmission channel;

detecting the polling tone associated with the vacant transmission channel at a second other wireless module; and

transmitting from the second other wireless module the sensing tone associated with the vacant transmission channel.

19. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

step (b) comprises establishing at least one of a unicast, a multicast, a broadcast, an any-cast, a unidirectional communication, and a bidirectional communication between the at least two of the plurality of wireless modules.

20. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

at least one of the sensing tone and polling tone is an unmodulated signal, a CW frequency, a digital sequence, and a digital sequence containing information relating only to an identity of a data channel

21. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

establishing communications comprises at least one of establishing communication to a different subset of wireless modules from a transmitting wireless module for each predetermined portion of data to be transmitted by the source wireless module and establishing communication on a different transmission channel for each predetermined portion of data to be transmitted by a transmitting wireless module.

22. A method according to claim 13 further comprising:

(c) at least one of maintaining transmission of the polling tone and sensing tone during communications between the at least two wireless modules, terminating transmission of the polling tone and sensing tone after transmitting a predetermined portion of data from a transmitting wireless module, and terminating transmission of the polling tone and sensing tone after a predetermined period of time.

23. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

the data channel provides communication according to at least one of Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access (OFDMA), Coded Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access, Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), Time Division Multiplexing (TDM), Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA), Frequency-Hopping Spread Spectrum (FHSS), and Direct-Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS).

24. A method according to claim 13 wherein,

step (b) comprises providing wireless modules supporting operation according to the wireless standard under first predetermined conditions and according to the method of claim 13 under second predetermined conditions.

25. A computer readable medium having stored therein data according to a predetermined computing device format, and upon execution of the data by a suitable computing device a method of establishing an arbitrary cooperation of a set of wireless modules in proximity is provided, comprising at least one of:

monitoring a plurality of sensing tones, each sensing tone associated with a transmission channel;

monitoring a plurality of polling tones, each polling tone associated with a transmission channel;

determining a vacant transmission channel, the vacant transmission channel being determined by an absence of at least one of its sensing tone, polling tone, and data transmission;

transmitting from a first wireless device the polling tone associated with the vacant transmission channel; and

transmitting from a second other wireless device the sensing tone associated with the vacant transmission channel.