Radar detection circuit for a WLAN transceiver

• US 20100194623A1
• Filed: 04/19/2010
• Published: 08/05/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/15/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Avago Technologies International Sales Pte Limited (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Broadcom Corporation (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Hansen, Christopher J.
• Granted Patent: US 8,081,104 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 342/52
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 7/021 Auxiliary means for detecting or identifying radar signals or the like, e.g. radar jamming signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/1027 assessing signal quality or detecting noise/interference for the received signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 15/02 Reducing interference from electric apparatus by means located at or near the interfering apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: H04K 2203/18 for wireless local area networks or WLAN
• CPC Class Codes: H04K 3/226 Selection of non-jammed channel for communication spectrum sharing arrangements H04W16/14; selection of wireless resources by user or terminal H04W72/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04K 3/822 by detecting the presence of a surveillance, interception or detection
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 16/14 Spectrum sharing arrangements between different networks

Abstract

A single chip radio transceiver includes circuitry that enables detection of radar signals to enable the radio transceiver to halt communications in overlapping communication bands to avoid interference with the radar transmitting the radar pulses. The radio transceiver is operable to evaluate a number of most and second most common pulse interval values to determine whether a traditional radar signal is present. The radio transceiver also is operable to FM demodulate an incoming signal to determine whether a non-traditional radar signal, such as a bin-5 radar signal, is present. After FM demodulation, the signal is averaged wherein a substantially large value is produced for non-traditional radar signals and a value approximately equal to zero is produced for a communication signal that is not FM modulated with a continuously increasing frequency signal. Gain control is used to limit incoming signal magnitude to a specified range of magnitudes.

Claims

1. An integrated circuit radio transceiver, comprising:

circuitry and logic for detecting traditional short pulse radar signals;

circuitry and logic for detecting non-traditional long pulse radar signals;

circuitry and logic for inhibiting wireless transmissions upon detection of either a short pulse or a long pulse radar signal; and

wherein the circuitry and logic for detecting the non-traditional long pulse radar signals comprises logic for;

reading pulse information from each receive path first in first out buffer (FIFO) into groups of arrays, wherein each group of arrays includes a start time array, a pulse width array, and an FM value array;

combining adjacent pulses in each array wherein, if the difference in start times between two adjacent pulses is less than a specified minimum spacing value, the method includes deleting the 2nd pulse and making the pulse width for the first pulse equal to the combined pulse width of the two original pulse widths; and

setting an FM value equal to the sum of the FM values of the two original pulse widths.

2. The radio transceiver of claim 1 further including circuitry and logic for combining each group of arrays into a single group and for sorting the pulses within the single group according to start time.

3. The radio transceiver of claim 1 further including circuitry and logic for combining pulses again and, if the start time between two adjacent pulses is less than the specified minimum spacing value, deleting the second pulse and keeping the first pulse without adding the pulse widths.

4. The radio transceiver of claim 1 further including circuitry and logic for adding pulse start times to a long pulse buffer for each pulse having a pulse width that is greater than a specified minimum width value and less than a specified maximum width value.

5. The radio transceiver of claim 4 further including circuitry and logic for, if a difference in start times between the newest pulse in the long pulse buffer and the oldest pulse is greater than a maximum window value, removing the oldest pulse and for repeating this step until no more pulses are removed.

6. The radio transceiver of claim 5 further including circuitry and logic for determining that a radar has been detected if a number of pulses greater than a specified number of long pulses remain in the long pulse buffer.

7. The radio transceiver of claim 5 further including circuitry and logic for determining, if a radar signal is not detected because the number of pulses was not greater than the specified number of long pulses, performing radar pulse detection for traditional radar signals.

8. The radio transceiver of claim 5 further including circuitry and logic for detecting bin-5 category radar signals.

9. An integrated circuit radio transceiver, comprising:

circuitry and logic for reading pulse information from each receive path first in first out buffer (FIFO) into groups of arrays, wherein each group of arrays includes a start time array, a pulse width array, and an FM value array wherein the FM values represent an absolute value of a difference an estimate of a frequency at a start of the pulse and an estimate of a frequency at an end of the pulse as determined by an FM demodulator;

circuitry and logic for combining adjacent pulses in each array wherein, if the difference in start times between two adjacent pulses is less than a specified minimum spacing value, the method includes deleting a 2nd pulse and setting the pulse width for a first pulse equal to the combined pulse width of the two original pulse widths; and

circuitry and logic for setting an FM value equal to the sum of the FM values of the two adjacent pulse widths.

10. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 9 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic combines adjacent pulses and calculates the FM array values for all pulses for each FIFO for each antenna.

11. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 9 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic combines adjacent pulses and calculates the FM array values for all pulses for each FIFO for each antenna.

12. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 9 further including combining each group of arrays into a single group.

13. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 12 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic combines adjacent pulses and calculates the FM array values for all pulses in the single group.

14. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 12 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic sorts the pulses within the single group according to start time.

15. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 12 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic combines pulses again and, if the start time between two adjacent pulses is less than a minimum spacing value, deletes the second pulse and keeping the first pulse width without adding the pulse widths of the two pulses.

16. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 12 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic determines whether a remaining number of pulses exceeds a specified value to determine that a long non-traditional radar has been detected.

17. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 12 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic determines whether a remaining number of pulses does not exceed a specified value to determine that a long non-traditional radar has not been detected.

18. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 12 wherein the integrated circuit radio transceiver circuitry and logic performs traditional radar analysis to determine a traditional radar signal is present.

19. An integrated circuit radio transceiver, comprising;

circuitry and logic for detecting traditional short pulse radar signals;

circuitry and logic for detecting non-traditional long pulse radar signals;

circuitry and logic for inhibiting wireless transmissions upon detection of either a short pulse or a long pulse radar signal; and

wherein the circuitry and logic for detecting the non-traditional long pulse radar signals comprises logic for;

adding pulse start times to a long pulse buffer for each pulse having a pulse width that is greater than a minimum width value and less than a maximum width value;

determining if a difference in start times between the newest pulse in the long pulse buffer and the oldest pulse is greater than a maximum window value;

removing the oldest pulse based upon the different in start times; and

if a number of pulses greater than a specified number of long pulses remain in the long pulse buffer, determining that a radar has been detected.

20. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 19 further including, wherein, the integrated circuit transceiver performs radar pulse detection for traditional radar signals if the circuitry and logic for detecting the non-traditional long pulse radar signals does not detect a radar signal.

21. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 19 operable to detect non-standard radar pulses having non-traditional long pulse lengths at least partially in hardware.

22. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 19 operable to perform at least a portion of traditional radar detection and non-traditional radar detection in hardware.

23. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 19 operable to perform at least a portion of traditional radar detection and non-traditional radar detection in software.

24. The integrated circuit radio transceiver of claim 19 operable to detect bin-5 category radar signals.