Performance Analysis of Cooperative Spectrum Sensing in Cognitive Radio

Cognitive radio is a new and exciting technology that, among other applications, has the potential to unlock the spectrum necessary for the deployment of next generation high data rate systems. Spectrum sensing is the key component of cognitive radio technology. However, detection is compromised when a user experiences shadowing or fading effects. In such cases, user cannot distinguish between an unused band and a deep fade. Thus, cooperative spectrum sensing is proposed to optimize the sensing performance. We have studied performance analysis of cooperative spectrum sensing in Cognitive Radio. This paper presents a simulation comparison of cooperative with non-cooperative spectrum sensing over Rayleigh fading channel based on AND, OR and MAJORITY rules. Comparing the non-cooperative curve with the cooperative curve over Rayleigh fading channel, we observed that spectrum sensing is better in presence of cooperation. We also observed that the OR rule has the better performance than AND and MAJORITY rule.