Wireless Pers Commun (2012) 62:1–29 DOI 10.1007/s11277-010-0035-3 Adaptability and Conﬁgurability in Cognitive Radio Design on Small Form Factor Software Radio Platform Y. Tachwali · F. Basma · H. H. Refai Published online: 11 June 2010 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC. 2010 Abstract The recent advances in cognitive radio technology based on software deﬁned radio platforms have extended the capabilities of wireless communication systems. The unique ability of cognitive radios to alter their communication protocols to meet changing system demands make them great candidates for wireless applications that are difﬁcult to implement using conventional wireless terminals. Small form factor platforms make cogni- tive radio portable and easy to deploy. This paper discusses the design and implementation methodology to build a cognitive radio on small form factor platform with heterogeneous pro- cessing architecture. The result of this discussion is a conﬁgurable wireless transceiver that features two important concepts of cognitive radio, namely conﬁgurability and adaptability. Keywords Cognitive radio · Software deﬁned radio · Small form factor · Conﬁgurability · Adaptability · FPGA · DSP · Architecture 1 Introduction Present-day wireless systems vastly underutilize the wireless spectrum. The Shared Spec- trum Company (SSC) reports that the average spectrum occupancy over radio bands between 30 and 3,000 MHZ is 5.2% in different locations [1]. This underutilization is the result of wasteful static spectrum allocations, ﬁxed radio functionalities and architectures, and limited cooperation between network nodes. Thus, ﬁnding alternative solutions to improve spec- trum utilization has become a popular focus in wireless research. Cognitive radio based on Y. Tachwali (B ) · F. Basma · H. H. Refai Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, University of Oklahoma, Tulsa Campus, 4502 E. 41st Street, Tulsa, OK 74135, USA e-mail: ytachwali@ou.edu F. Basma e-mail: fadi.basma@ou.edu H. H. Refai e-mail: hazem@ou.edu 123