Radio Engineering: From Software Radio to Cognitive Radio

Chapter 2Cognitive Terminals Toward CognitiveNetworks¹

 

 

 

2.1. Introduction

The development of large and autonomous mobile telecommunications networks is accompanied by many technological challenges having a common goal of introducing artificial intelligence at the level of these networks. One of the first questions to be addressed is to determine in which part of the network this intelligence must be more developed. Indeed, it is often understood that the fixed infrastructure of a mobile network, owing to its potential of fast information processing and data storage capacity, is more proficient in controlling the network than would be the whole set of mobile terminals. In this situation, increased intelligence at the network level corresponds to: (i) incorporating intelligence in base stations so that they can respond to individual requests of the mobile users, and (ii) developing the interactions between the fixed base stations so as to make constructive interference between the cells, i.e. non-destructive, and optimize the resource distribution. However, it is not always feasible for a given architecture to control many users simultaneously, especially when these users are highly mobile. Indeed, in such a situation, the instantaneous computational load for fixed infrastructure could not permit responding to all the queries of the users.

An orthogonal vision is to move network intelligence toward mobile users. If the mobile users at any instant are able to evaluate the resources ...