Cognitive Radio Channel Allocation Using Auction Mechanisms

We adopt the auction mechanisms into the dynamic channel allocation of cognitive radio networks. Under auction schemes, users bid the transmission time slots to gain access to the licensed channel. Their bids accumulate throughout the repeated bidding process over time, and they pay the "bill" at the end of the time frame in the form of out-band sensing. By doing so, we allocate the channel to the user who values it most, and impose a responsibility for out-band sensing which is split up among users according to their aggregate winning bids. We study the allocation under both first and second price sealed-bid auctions and find that they yield similar outcomes in terms of throughput and efficiency. We also develop two auction-based improvement schemes to address the traffic issue in secondary nodes, and the system performance receives a significant boost as a result.