THEME WIRELESS
A NEW ERA OF SPECTRUM USE THANKS TO AI AND SDR A team of Imec researchers, together with scientists from Rutgers University, have participated in the finals of the Darpa Spectrum Collaboration Challenge. Their idea: using AI to teach wireless devices to avoid spectral collisions. Els Parton
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ince Marconi sent the first wireless signal across the oceans back in 1901, nothing much has changed: a wireless link between two appliances still relies on the fact that the two parties have agreed beforehand on which frequency they’ll use to communicate. Following, the spectrum has been divided into rigidly and exclusively licensed bands, each reserved for one type of communication. Only a few narrow unlicensed bands
can be used freely. These have been occupied by Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or the IoT, for example. In these unlicensed bands, traffic has exploded. In most licensed bands, in contrast, the spectrum is either underutilized or hardly used. Consider bands that are reserved for emergency communication or for sporadic bursts from satellites. This static frequency plan leads to problems. Just think of 4G communication that becomes unusable after
an attack or of areas without 3G or 4G signal where forest fires blaze and communication is a matter of life or death. Or think of employees trying to work in train stations, coffee shops or any other place, getting frustrated with the slow Wi-Fi because of too many users in the same area.
Towards a flexible RF allocation
If we want to continue this wireless era without these hurdles, we
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