Medium Access Control Protocol Design, Analysis and Identification in Cognitive Radio Networks

Cognitive Radio (CR) is a promising technique to address the spectrum scarcity issue by enabling the unlicensed network users (SUs) to dynamic access the spectrum holes. This thesis designs Medium Access Control (MAC) protocols for SUs to utilize the unused spectrum without interfering the licensed network users’ (PUs) transmissions; analyzes the MAC performance based on the queuing theories; and identifies the PU’s and SU’s MAC protocol types using machine learning techniques in order to implement smart cognitive radio.