Maximum-minimum eigenvalue detection for cognitive radio

Sensing (signal detection) is a fundamental problem in cognitive radio. In this paper, a new method is proposed based on the eigenvalues of the covariance matrix of the received signal. It is shown that the ratio of the maximum eigenvalue to the minimum eigenvalue can be used to detect the signal existence. Based on some latest random matrix theories (RMT), we can quantize the ratio and find the threshold. The probability of false alarm is also found by using the RMT. The proposed method overcomes the noise uncertainty difficulty while keeps the advantages of the energy detection. The method can be used for various sensing applications without knowledge of the signal, the channel and noise power. Simulations based on randomly generated signals and captured ATSC DTV signals are presented to verify the methods.