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ISART 2016: A Canadian prototype for spectrum monitoring

WESTMINSTER, Colorado – When more information is needed about the radio frequency environment, who is responsible for collecting and analyzing that data?
That was one of the central questions at this week’s International Symposium for Advanced Radio Technologies conference, which focused on the concept of “spectrum forensics,” which is monitoring and collecting data about the RF environment for regulatory, network planning, network operations or optimization purposes, among others.
The conference covered a number of perspectives on interference hunting and spectrum monitoring from the Federal Communications Commission, which is in the process of a modernization order that is likely to cut its resources for regulatory enforcement even further and mean that industry players have to take on more spectrum monitoring and interference resolution responsibilities themselves – particularly as spectrum sharing becomes more prevalent with initiatives at 3.5 GHz, with FirstNet’s spectrum and in AWS-3 bands.
ISART also spotlighted work on a prototype for an advanced spectrum monitoring system in Canada. As Li Li, senior research scientist with the Communications Research Centre Canada, described it, regulators set a vision for better spectrum environment awareness to promote efficient management and to maximize the use of spectrum through advanced monitoring.
“They realized that spectrum was getting more congested, and they needed to do something because of more interference issues and more complexity,” said Mathieu Gemme, a telecommunications analyst with the government of Canada’s Department of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, of which the CRC is part.
The prototype system is a monitoring network with underpinnings based in big data and “internet of things” solutions, with the goal being that spectrum managers can make queries on the RF environment and get answers in near real-time. Li said that a big data analytics center is under development at the CRC that should be finished by the end of this year that will integrate the data with analytics intelligence to support what she described as “big data science-based spectrum management.”
Gemme said that there is an existing monitoring network that includes 80 fixed sites mounted on towers, with equipment in shelters at the base that includes spectrum analyzers and computers. Those sites are mainly in urban areas and are primarily used for interference investigations and compliance, he said. In addition, there are 50 mobile monitoring vehicles, eight monitoring trailers and two specialty vehicles. The trailers, Gemme noted, are sometimes preferred to other vehicles because they can be left at locations to do monitoring over longer stretches of time.
The ability to do extensive monitoring is important to regulators for a number of reasons. In addition to making sure that spectrum policy is being complied with and tracking down sources of interference such as GPS jammers and nonconforming sources of radio frequencies, good spectrum-monitoring data can inform licensing decisions and give regulators insight into whether and how occupied a particular band is, whether bands might be good candidates for re-farming, and how successful an agency’s spectrum policies are.
Li added that the system has tremendous potential for learning about the radio environment through more sensors that can report on different spectra around them, with different capabilities and characteristics, from a variety of vendors. She added the system development also serves as preparation for spectrum management of “5G” systems.
 
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ABOUT AUTHOR

Kelly Hill
Kelly Hill
Kelly reports on network test and measurement, as well as the use of big data and analytics. She first covered the wireless industry for RCR Wireless News in 2005, focusing on carriers and mobile virtual network operators, then took a few years’ hiatus and returned to RCR Wireless News to write about heterogeneous networks and network infrastructure. Kelly is an Ohio native with a masters degree in journalism from the University of California, Berkeley, where she focused on science writing and multimedia. She has written for the San Francisco Chronicle, The Oregonian and The Canton Repository. Follow her on Twitter: @khillrcr