Ultrawideband (UWB) technology will benefit from new efforts led by Wisair during Phase II of the PULSERS (Pervasive Ultra-wideband low Spectral Energy Radio Systems) research project. Phase II is a consortium of 36 industrial and academic organizations, each having a European presence. Wisair is leading the work on orthaogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) Very High Data Rates (greater than 1 Gbps) for UWB within this organization.

According to Serdar Yurdakul, Director of Marketing & Business Development, USA at Wisair, Phase I of the PULSERS project explored 1 Gbps feasibility as well as compatibility issues with existing radio services. Phase II will be focused on UWB implementation, pervasion and regulatory issues. For example, Europe, Korea and Japan may see approvals inside six months. Yurdakul cited the potential overlap of existing and planned Fixed Wireless, 3G and 4G wireless services with UWB within these countries as the main concern addressed by the approval process.

During Phase I, detect and avoid (DAA) technology was developed and demonstrated to the European Regulators as an adaptive feature for UWB systems that would search for competing RF signals and adjust the UWB settings to avoid any potential overlap. A straightforward method of adjusting the UWB signal might simply be to switch to a different band among the three available within the WiMedia UWB standard, each being 528 MHz wide. However, a more flexible alternative is to drop some of the 128 OFDM tones available within each band, which is another technique used by DAA. Yurdakul stated that this technology was presented to European regulators under the PULSERS group in October 2005.

While the capabilities of existing UWB products are impressive, the next level of performance for the technology is being explored, even as acceptance and adaptation is being sought for UWB at its current stage of development. Data rates are about 480 Mbps today, and expanding to and above 1 Gbps would support most applications envisioned for UWB. One application particularly well suited for these high bandwidths is wireless access for computer hard drives, especially for the up- or down-loading of large amounts of content.

Another trend UWB is likely to follow will be in wireless network connectivity. According to Yurdakul, this will occur in three stages. The first stage will see the adaptation of wireless USB. The next will be the development of WiNet, which will provide IP-based wireless UWB connectivity through a network. The third stage will see the emergence of Bluetooth over UWB, an effort that will be supported by the Bluetooth SIG and the WiMedia alliance. While wireless USB is a hub-and-spoke model, Bluetooth uses a peer-to-peer model that could enable UWB mesh networking.

Another advance will be the implementation of UWB as a single chip solution. Wisair’s current UWB solution is a chipset having only two components, and Yurdakul stated that the baseband IC is fabricated on a 0.13 μm mixed-signal CMOS process. A single-chip CMOS solution for UWB from Wisair will sample at the end of the year. Also, while the range of UWB is currently limited to about 10 meters, methods of extending that range will be explored under PULSERS.

As Phase II of PULSERS advances, designers will undoubtedly find a host of applications for UWB. The first among these will most likely exploit the particular strength of UWB in transferring digital content to and from mobile devices. As Yurdakul stated, “most portable consumer electronic products are simply value-added mass-storage devices.”