Cooperative spectrum sensing optimization in cognitive radio networks

Cognitive radio is being recognized as an intelligent technology due to its ability to rapidly and autonomously adapt operating parameters to changing environments and conditions. In order to reliably and swiftly detect spectrum holes in cognitive radios, spectrum sensing must be used. In this paper, we consider cooperative spectrum sensing in order to optimize the sensing performance. We focus on energy detection for spectrum sensing and find that the optimal fusion rule is the half voting rule. Next, the optimal detection threshold of energy detection is determined numerically. Finally, we propose a fast spectrum sensing algorithm for a large network which requires fewer than the total number of cognitive radios to perform cooperative spectrum sensing while satisfying a given error bound.