Distributed spectrum monitoring and surveillance using a cognitive radio based testbed

This paper described the development and implementation of a distributed spectrum monitoring and surveillance testbed for identifying and locating RF signals using the Universal Software Radio Peripheral (USRP). We use a centralized RF trace collection testbed to establish the baseline, and we focus on distributed RF trace collection. Challenges associated with synchronization is identified and candidate solutions are discussed. The distributed testbed was implemented using NI USRPs (293×/295×) with LabVIEW. The complex nature of implementing the distributed case necessitate the choice of LabVIEW because of the versatile features provided. Potential applications are discussed and sample traces are demonstrated.