Wide-band packet radio for multipath environments

A direct-sequence spread-spectrum packet radio is described that has versatile signal-processing and local-control capabilities designed to support the functions required of a robust mobile communications network. Noteworthy capabilities include eleven selectable data rates with accurate range measurements in a fading multipath channel. The radio uses a hybrid analog/digital signal processor and nonrepeating spreading codes for suppression of intersymbol interference and jamming. It incorporates two sets of monolithic surface-acoustic-wave convolvers as programmable matched filters with time-bandwidth products of 64 and 2000. The analog matched filters are coupled with binary postprocessing for the functions of detection, RAKE demodulations and ranging measurements over a wide multipath spread. The data rate can be varied in response to channel conditions from 1.45 Mb/s down to 44 b/s with an almost ideal tradeoff in signal-processing gain from 18 dB up to 61 dB prior to multipath combining