Cyclo-Stationary Sensing of OFDM Waveforms in the Presence of Receiver RF Impairments

Reliable spectrum sensing is the key requirement for secondary users to utilize the spectrum in the absence of primary users. Given the widespread deployment of OFDM modulation in recent and future multimedia broadcasting and wireless broadband services, reliable spectrum sensing of OFDM waveforms is of great interest in cognitive radios. Although feature detection methods outperform energy detection ones, however they are generally more sensitive to RF impairments. In this paper, we have investigated the effects of a non-ideal receiver RF chain on the performance of the Pilot-Aided Cyclo-Stationary Detection (PACSD). Our study demonstrates how the performance of PACSD degrades due phase noise and carrier frequency offset while it is more tolerant to I/Q imbalances.