2014 International Conference on Advances in Commuication and Computing Technologies
“Design And Implementation Of OFDM Based Cognitive
Radio System And Its Analysis”
S.S.Magdum1
Dept. of Electronics and Telecommunication
Sanjay Bhokare Group of Institutes
Miraj, Maharashtra , INDIA
magadumsandip@gmail.com
Abstract— In the wireless communication field we are dealing
with new emerging technologies and applications . Due to large
no. of applications we are scarcity of radio spectrum. Thus,
spectrum utilization is very important issue nowadays. In order
to utilize the radio spectrum and increase the efficiency of the
wireless communication system we need to design a compact
system. The purpose of our project is to design an OFDM based
cognitive radio system and analyze the performance of the system
in terms various channel parameter over different fading
channels. Initially we are have designed and implemented this
system and then by setting different channel environment as well
as system parameters we have observed efficiency of the system
in terms of bit error rate and other parameters. By varying
system parameters and setting the different channel environment
we can observe the behavior of the system.
Index Terms— OFDM, TDMA, FDMA, CDMA MATLAB,AWGN,CR
I. INTRODUCTION
In the wireless communication field now a days a lot of
inventions are going on. Large no of applications with
different band of spectrum requirements are been used in
our daily life. In order to provide well managed we need to
use no of wireless application but doing proper spectrum
utilization. The inspiration of this project is to have
efficient use of the spectrum and increase the efficiency of
the system. However , in order to minimize the interference
and provide uninterrupted service to the customers we need
to use most efficient multiplexing technology so that we can
minimize the spectrum requirement and interference. [ 1]
In the past several years, lots of multiplexing
technologies are implemented. There are different
techniques like time division multiplexing , frequency
division multiplexing , code division multiplexing. The
most efficient and reliable amongst all is orthogonal
frequency division multiplexing . In this project we are
going to implement this OFDM technique. Along with the
multiplexing technique we are dealing with a new system
which can properly utilize the radio spectrum for different
users. The concept of using unused bands for the other
wireless applications is cognitive radio . The cognitive radio
is built on software defined radio system which itself adapts
input signal variations of the system and provides reliable
communication by identifying the vacant band [2] .
978-1-4799-7319-4/14/$31.00©2014 IEEE
S.S.Bidwai2
Dept. of Electronics and Telecommunication
Annasaheb Dange College of Engineering & Technology
Ashta, INDIA
sandeep.bidwai1@gmail.com
In this project we are going to implement OFDM based
cognitive radio system. In order to design this system we
need to implement different basic building blocks.
Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM)
signal can be considered as group of narrow band signals,
and by increasing the number of subcarriers, the bandwidth
of each subcarrier becomes narrower. Here we select the
subcarrier spacing to be less than the coherence bandwidth
of the channel. Every subcarrier is going to be affected by a
flat channel and thus no channel equalization is needed. To
avoid ISI, symbols duration is extended by adding a guard
band to the beginning of each symbol in what is known as
Cyclic Prefix (CP).If we define the delay spread (or
multipath spread) of the channel as the delay between the
first and last received paths over the channel, the CP should
be longer than that delay. In order to avoid fast fading
effect, OFDM symbol time is chosen to be shorter than the
coherence time of the channel. In the frequency domain,
mobility results in a frequency spread of the signal which
depends on the operating frequency and the relative speed
between the transmitter and receiver, also known as Doppler
spread. Doppler spread of OFDM signals results in Inter-
Carrier Interference (ICI) which can be reduced by
increasing the subcarrier spacing.
II. RESEARCH METHOD
The implementation of OFDM system involves following
blocks. The first thing that should be considered in designing
the OFDM transmitter is the number of subcarriers required
to send the given data. As a generic case, lets assume that we
have N subcarriers. Each subcarriers are centered at
frequencies that are orthogonal to each other that is usually
multiples of frequencies. The second design parameter could
be the modulation format that we wish to use. An OFDM
signal can be constructed using anyone of the following digital
modulation techniques namely BPSK, QPSK, QAM etc.., The
data (D) has to be first converted from serial stream into
parallel stream depending on the number of sub-carriers (N).
Since we assumed that there are N subcarriers allowed for the
OFDM transmission, we name the subcarriers from 0 to N-1.
Now, the Serial to Parallel converter takes the serial stream of
input bits and outputs N parallel streams (indexed from 0 to
N-1). These parallel streams are individually converted into
the required digital modulation format like BPSK, QPSK,
QAM and many more. Let’s call this output S0,S1,..SN. The
conversion of parallel data (D) into the digitally modulated
data (S) is usually achieved by a constellation mapper, which
is essentially a look up table. Once the data bits are converted
to required modulation format, they need to be superimposed
on the required orthogonal subcarriers for transmission. This
is achieved by a series of N parallel sinusoidal oscillators
tuned to N orthogonal frequencies f0,f1,…fN-1. Finally, the
resultant output from the N parallel arms are summed up
together to produce the OFDM signal. The following figure
illustrates the basic concept of OFDM transmission [5].
Figure 2.1: OFDM Transceiver
By working with OFDM in frequency domain the
modulated QPSK data symbols are fed onto the orthogonal
sub-carriers. But transfer of signal over a channel is only
possible in its time-domain. For which we implement IDFT
which converts the OFDM signal in from frequency domain to
time domain. IDFT being a linear transformation can be easily
applied to the system and DFT can be applied at the receiver
end to regain the original data in frequency domain at the
receiver end. Since the basis of Fourier transform is orthogonal
in nature we can implement to get the time domain equivalent
of the OFDM signal from its frequency components.
Usually, in practice instead of DFT and IDFT we
implement Fast Fourier Transformation for an N-input signal
system because of the lower hardware complexity of the
system.
Generally, an OFDM signal can be represented as,
s(t) = symbols mapped to chosen constellation
(BPSK/QPSK/QAM etc..,) Fn = orthogonal frequency This
equation can be thought of as an IFFT process ( Inverse Fast
Fourier Transform). The Fourier transform breaks a signal into
different frequency bins by multiplying the signal with a series
of sinusoids. This essentially translates the signal from time
domain to frequency domain. But, we always view IFFT as a
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conversion process from frequency domain to time domain.
FFT is represented by,
where as its dual , IFFT is given by,
The equation for FFT and IFFT differ by the co-efficient
they take and the minus sign. Both equation does the same
thing. They multiply the incoming signal with a series of
sinusoids and separates them into bins. In fact, FFT and IFFT
are dual and behaves in a similar way. IFFT and FFT blocks
are interchangeable [4].
III Channel Environment .
In this project work we are going to observe the
performance of OFDM based CR system over the different
channel environments . It plays very important part as channel
may cause different types of fading of the transmitted signal
based on the environment. In wireless telecommunications,
multipath is the propagation phenomenon that results in radio
signals' reaching the receiving antenna by two or more paths.
Causes of multipath include atmospheric ducting, ionospheric
reflection and refraction, and reflection from terrestrial objects,
such as mountains and buildings. The effects of multipath
include constructive and destructive interference, and phase
shifting of the signal. This distortion of signals caused by
multipath is known as fading [6]. Due to the path delay and
fading of the signal we may the signal variations at the
receiver. A fading channel in communication has to undergo
over different fading phenomenon’s during single transmission.
The radio propagated signal from different objects combine to
form multipath signals generated in fading channel. Due to
multipath signal propagation paths, multiple signals will be
received by receiver and the actual received signal becomes
sum of all components. There may be addition or subtraction of
the signal coming from different angle of arrival [7] [12].
In this work we are going to deal with , Additive
White Gaussian Noise Model, the simplest radio environment
in which a wireless communications system or a local
positioning system or proximity detector based on time of
flight will have to operate is the Additive-White Gaussian
Noise (AWGN) [ ]environment. Additive white Gaussian noise
(AWGN) is the commonly used to transmit signal while signals
travel from the channel and simulate background noise of
channel. The mathematical expression in received signal r(t) =
s(t) + n(t) that passed through the AWGN channel where s(t) is
transmitted signal and n(t) is background noise. An AWGN
channel adds white Gaussian noise to the signal that passes
through it. It is the basic communication channel model and
used as a standard channel model. The transmitted signal gets
disturbed by a simple additive white Gaussian noise process[8].
 different stages and we get result of almost every stage. These
Transmitted results we are going to discuss in this paper.
Channel Received Signals
Signlas S(t) r(t) = s(t) + n(t) V. OFDM SYSTEM RESULT
+

Fig. 2.2 AWGN channel model

III. USER DETECTION USING ENERGY DETECTION

METHOD
In this work we have defined one block to
understand the presence and absence of the signal in system.
Generally while designing the OFDM based cognitive radio
system. Here, an energy detector block is implemented at the
receiver side. Energy detection is a non coherent detection Figure 3.1: shows the user data signal which is to be
method that is used to detect the licensed user signal. . It is a transmitted. For the modulation and generation of OFDM
simple method in which prior knowledge of primary or signal
licensed user signal is not required, it is one of popular and
easiest sensing technique of non-cooperative sensing in
cognitive radio networks [6]. If the noise power is known, then
energy detector is good choice. Mathematical model for
Energy detection is given by the following two hypotheses H0
and H1 : H0: (primary user absent) y(n) = u(n) n = 1, 2, . . . ,N
H1: (primary user present) y(n) = s(n) + u(n) n = 1, 2, . . . ,N
(1) Where u (n) is noise and s (n) is the primary user
signal[10].

Fig.2.3 Basic building block of Energy Detector Figure 3.2: shows the actual OFDM signal which is to be
transmitted over the different channels
Basically we are implementing an OFDM based cognitive
radio system where one can understand whether the user is
present or not. This can be done with different spectrum
sensing methods. These methods consists of various
information regarding the user signal .This method very easy
method as it does not require any primary information of the
signal. Therefore it is easy to implement and get the results.
This block is implemented at the receiver side of the system.
Based on the detection of the signal we can find the probability
of detection of the signal as well as misdetection and false
alarm detection.
In this way we have implemented the
OFDM based cognitive radio system with different
environment condition and spectrum sensing methods to
determine the efficiency of the system in terms of different Figure 3.3: OFDM signal transmitted over AWGN channel
parameters. through OFDM based CR system

IV. RESULTS AND ANALYSIS

The experimental results are represented below.
The MATLAB is used as simulation tool for design and
implementation of the above system. This system works over

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 Figure 3.6: Comparison of transmitted and received signal over
AWGN channel with noise showing slight change in received
bits of signal

Figure 3.7 shows the behaviour of bit error rate over the
AWGN

Figure 3.4: OFDM signal transmitted over Rayleigh

channel through OFDM based CR system

Fig. 3.8 shows the behaviour of bit error rate over the
Rayleigh fading channel

Thus above results are taken from MATLAB simulation

Figure 3.5: shows the the behavior of the signal from
which we can observe graph showing probability of
detecting signal using energy detector block as signal to
noise ratio increases
for OFDM based cognitive radio system. Also we have to
describe the behaviour of this system with different parameters.
We have observed the changes in its parameters due to noise
and fading of the signal. The below table describes the details
of the parameters.
Table 1.0 : Behaviour of OFDM signal over different
fading channels in OFDM based CR system

Parameters Values Values Values Values

Bit Rate 5000 5000 bits 5000bits 5000bits
bits
Doppler Shift 4 hz 4 hz 10hz 10hz
Path Delay 0 2е -5 0 2е -5 0 2е -10 0 2е -10

Average Path 0 - 9 0 - 9 0 -9 0 -9
Gain
Bit Error 0 0.6094 0 0.4688
Rate
nErrors 0 78 0 60

Channel AWGN Rayleigh AWGN Rayleigh

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 Thus from the above table it is clear that the system can be
more efficient in AWGN channel in comparison with the [11 ] Z. Kang, K. Yao, and F. Lorenzelli, “Nakagami-m
other fading channel. By varying the system parameters we can fading modeling in the frequency domain for
observe the behaviour of the system. OFDM system analysis”, IEEE Commun. Lett. , vol.
7, no. 10, pp. 484–486, Oct. 2003. .
CONCLUSION [12] T. S. Rappaport, “Wireless Communication:
Principles and Practice”: 2nd Edition,
Therefore, we have designed an OFDM based Prentice Hall, 2002.
cognitive radio system and simulated with different fading
channels. Thus , this system represents behaviour of the signal
over different fading channels . We can say that an OFDM
based system can be made efficient by reducing bit error rate
varying parameters of fading channels.

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