Real-time decoding of automatic dependent surveillance - Broadcast signals by using software-defined radio and MATLAB®

In telecommunications engineering degrees, simulations are used to understand better theoretical concepts. However, in courses related to digital communications or signal processing usually these simulations cannot be easily applied to real data or in real scenarios. This limitation does not allow the students to verify that the learned theoretical hypotheses are valid in practice. Nowadays, software defined radio platforms have been proposed to validate theoretical telecommunications concepts in real situations. Therefore, by combining a software defined radio and simulation tools, students can implement the learned notions over real data in real scenarios. This allows students to work under real applications in order to learn by experience and to see that the theoretical concepts are valid in the real world. This paper presents a project involving real-time decoding of automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B) signals, implemented by using a universal software radio peripheral software defined radio and MATLAB (R). The universal software radio peripheral allows to receive real automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast signals sent by the aircraft. Then, by using MATLAB (R) tools, the automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast baseband signals are decoded. The students are guided through a manual to demodulate the real automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast signals and display in a map the aircraft trajectories. The evaluation is based on a competition between the students, considering execution time of their algorithms, and a final report of the project. This project allows to obtain a game-oriented and novel approach for teaching digital communications and signal processing. The implementation of this project in telecommunications engineering courses motivate the students, allowing them to understand better difficult theoretical concepts, and improve their computer, teamwork, and collaboration skills. The originality of the approach is based on the usage of a prototyping platform, combined with simulation tools, for practical application of telecommunications engineering concepts using real signals.