II-EN: Radio Testbed Upgrade to Enable Wideband and MIMO Experiments

该项目对弗吉尼亚理工大学(VT)的认知无线电网络测试床(Cornet)进行了升级，增加了新的处理、联网和射频(RF)硬件和软件，并重新设计了测试床架构，以支持跨许多工程和科学学科的尖端研究。Cornet目前有48个软件可编程无线电节点，七年来促进了无线通信方面的实验研究和教育。此次升级将增加必要的无线电和计算基础设施，通过与弗吉尼亚理工大学的计算机科学、电气和计算机工程以及航空航天和海洋工程研究人员的合作，支持在通信、计算和运输等新兴和新技术/监管/经济领域进行引人注目的CISE研究和实验。新的Cornet试验床能够推进射频(RF)频谱接入、通过共享实现有效按需服务提供的资源虚拟化以及分布式资源(RF频谱、无线电节点、计算节点、试验床)与政府商业通信系统和雷达、自动驾驶车辆、第五代(5G)蜂窝通信、物联网等多种应用共存的联合研究。拟议的升级是必要的，以使Cornet能够继续服务于弗吉尼亚理工大学的跨部门和跨学科研究需求。该试验台允许不同的学生和教职员工在几个学科的科学和技术方面进行学习、合作和创新。教育活动包括扩展弗吉尼亚理工大学的本科生和研究生课程，通过利用新的试验台功能的实验动手课程。该项目集中在三个核心方面：(A)硬件升级，(B)网络/资源管理升级(虚拟化、计算集群，更好的调度)，(C)用户软件升级(预先配置的实验和教程)。硬件升级增加了30个宽带Ettus Research USRP x310软件定义无线电(SDR)前端(X310)，带有60个宽带子板和多个天线。由30台多核服务器组成的高性能计算集群，组成非传统的共享基带处理中心。分布式射频前端通过允许灵活关联的专用10 Gbps以太网络连接到中央计算群集。拟议的软件升级允许资源虚拟化，以实现有效的无线电、计算和网络资源共享，并更好地支持用户和实验管理。四个室内试验床层中的一个将配备12对X310，这些X310可以配置为MIMO操作或用作收发器和监视器。将安装额外的x310对，其余三层每层各安装一对，并重新部署当前硬件，以支持尽可能多的并发用户和用例场景。该配置允许对空间多路复用、分集、波束形成和测向技术以及相关通信协议进行实验研究。监控配置通过为每个发射器提供实时和可识别的频谱，以便根据需要进行分析、记录或显示，从而促进频谱共享研究和教育，以支持实验、教程或竞赛。将开发基本教程，以使弗吉尼亚理工大学的广大研究人员和学生能够有效地访问和使用试验床。

The project upgrades the Cognitive Radio Network Testbed (CORNET) at Virginia Tech (VT) by adding new processing, networking and radio frequency (RF) hardware and software and redesigning the testbed architecture to enable cutting edge research across many engineering and science disciplines. CORNET currently comprises 48 software programmable radio nodes that have facilitated experimental research and education in wireless communications for seven years. The upgrade will add the necessary radio and computing infrastructure to support compelling CISE research and experimentation in emerging and new technological/regulatory/economic areas in communications, computing and transportation, among others, through collaborations with computer science, electrical and computer engineering and aerospace and ocean engineering researchers at Virginia Tech. The new CORNET testbed enables advancing research in radio frequency (RF) spectrum access, resource virtualization for effective on demand service provisioning through sharing, and federation of distributed resources (RF spectrum, radio nodes, computing nodes, testbeds) with applications to coexistence of government commercialcommunications systems and radars, autonomous vehicles, fifth generation (5G) cellular communications, Internet of Things, and many others. The proposed upgrades are needed to enable CORNET to continue to serve cross department and interdisciplinary research needs at Virginia Tech. The testbed allows a diverse student and faculty population to learn, cooperate and innovate in science and technology across several disciplines. The educational activities include extending undergraduate and graduate classes at Virginia Tech with experimental hands on sessions that leverage the new testbed capabilities.The project focuses on three core thrusts: (a) Hardware upgrade, (b) Network/resource management upgrade (virtualization, computing clusters, better scheduling), (c) User software upgrade (preconfigured experiments & tutorials). The hardware upgrade adds 30 wide-band Ettus Research USRP X310 software defined radio (SDR) front ends (X310s) with 60 wide-band daughter boards and multiple antennas. A high performance computing cluster consisting of 30 multi-core servers to form a nontraditional shared baseband processing center. The distributed RF front ends are connected to the central computing cluster through a dedicated 10 Gbps Ethernet network that allows flexible association. Proposed software upgrades allow resource virtualization for efficient radio, computing and network resource sharing and better support for user and experiment management. One of the four indoor testbed floors will be equipped with 12 pairs of X310s that can be configured for MIMO operation or use as transceiver and monitor. Additional X310 pairs will be installed, one pair on each of the remaining three floors, and current hardware redeployed to support as many concurrent users and use case scenarios as possible. The configuration enables experimental investigation of spatial multiplexing, diversity, beam forming, and direction-finding techniques and related communication protocols. The monitoring configuration facilitates spectrum sharing research and education by providing real-time and identifiable spectra for each transmitter to be analyzed, logged, or displayed as needed to enable an experiment, tutorial, or contest. Basic tutorials will be developed to enable effective access and use of the testbed by a broad population of researchers and students at Virginia Tech.