Implementation of a Cognitive Radio Front-End Using Rotatable Controlled Reconfigurable Antennas

Author

Tawk, Y. ; Costantine, J. ; Avery, K. ; Christodoulou, C.G.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Univ. of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA

Volume

59

Issue

5

fYear

2011

fDate

5/1/2011 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

1773

Lastpage

1778

Abstract

This communication presents a new antenna system designed for cognitive radio applications. The antenna structure consists of a UWB antenna and a frequency reconfigurable antenna system. The UWB antenna scans the channel to discover “white space” frequency bands while tuning the reconfigurable section to communicate within these bands. The frequency agility is achieved via a rotational motion of the antenna patch. The rotation is controlled by a stepper motor mounted on the back of the antenna structure. The motor´s rotational motion is controlled by LABVIEW on a computer connected to the motor through its parallel port. The computer´s parallel port is connected to a NPN Darlington array that is used to drive the stepper motor. The antenna has been simulated with the driving motor being taken into consideration. A good agreement is found between the simulated and the measured antenna radiation properties.

Keywords

antenna radiation patterns; cognitive radio; drives; microstrip antennas; stepping motors; ultra wideband antennas; virtual instrumentation; LABVIEW; NPN Darlington array; UWB antenna; antenna patch; antenna radiation property; antenna rotational motion; antenna structure; antenna system design; cognitive radio front-end; driving motor; frequency agility; frequency reconfigurable antenna system; parallel port; rotatable controlled reconfigurable antenna; stepper motor; white space frequency band; Antenna measurements; Antenna radiation patterns; Frequency measurement; Loss measurement; Sensors; Shape; Cognitive radio; UWB; reconfigurable antenna; stepper motor;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Antennas and Propagation, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-926X

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TAP.2011.2122239

Filename

5722993