Enriching Cognitive Radio: Reaching beyond secondary spectrum access

The concept of cognitive radio (CR) has been established for approximately a decade. It is, however, only recently finding its way to realization, facilitated by regulatory relaxation and advances in technology including greater radio tuneability and adaptability through techniques such as software defined/controlled radio. In its short lifetime, CR has experienced a number of different visions as to the epoch of its capability. As opposed to the recent implicit assumption of CR as merely involving intelligent secondary (opportunistic) spectrum access, here we attempt to revive the appetite for more intricate views of its purpose, thereby introducing some of our own concepts. We evaluate some of these concepts, and show significant potential for performance and efficiency enhancement through them.