Multi-level environment identification method for impulsive radio systems

Current wireless communication systems strongly need to know if a line-of-sight (LOS) path is present between transmitter and receiver. The next generation of wireless systems will require more than the simple distinction between a LOS and a non-LOS (NLOS) link condition. The future short-range wireless communication and localization systems will require an exact environment identification in order to better set up all the services which the users require with a specific quality level. In this paper a new method for environment identification is proposed. This method is able to identify not only the LOS/NLOS condition but also the environment typology, i.e., if the propagation condition is typical of an office or a residential or an industrial area or outdoor, etc. If the environment in which the transmitter and the receiver are immersed is known, two main advantages can be reached: first, the localization of all the users is more accurate and, secondly, each receiver can be correctly configured in order to best adapt to the propagation conditions (cognitive approach) or to the network conditions (cooperative approach). Unlike the techniques discussed in the literature, the one proposed in this paper does not require any estimation, such as the estimation of the channel parameters. The method proposed here is based on statistical processing of the raw received probe UWB signal.