Experimental validation of new non-coherent chaotic modulation via SDR implementation

Abstract

In this article, a new non-coherent chaotic modulation based on the classical Frequency Modulation (FM) technique is proposed and experimentally validated under realistic wireless communication scenarios by using Software Defined Radio (SDR) technology. In the proposed modulation, named FM-Chip Averaging Chaotic On-Off Keying (FM-CACOOK), we simply combine the FM modulation with the recent proposed chaotic modulation technique CA-COOK. Firstly, we validate the proposed technique via several Matlab simulations scenarios in the context of wireless chaotic transmission through different IEEE 802.15.4a channel models. In this context, we choose the Office LOS (Line Of Sight) and NLOS (Non Line Of Sight), the industrial LOS, the Outdoor LOS and the Open Outdoor NLOS in order to make a mixture of indoor and outdoor environments for LOS and NLOS propagation. Secondly, we implement the proposed modulation by using GNU-Radio Companion (GRC) software. For this, several new GRC blocks have been added to perform and test the FM-CACOOK modulation in SDR platforms such as RTL-SDR dongle and HackRF. Finally, experimental tests have been performed to demonstrate the reliability and the strengths of the considered modulation. The obtained experimental results validate our solution by deriving the Bit Error Rate (BER) performances curve of FM-CACOOK compared to that of Differential Chaos-Shift Keying (DCSK), which is the reference chaotic modulation, and to that of the recent CA-COOK modulation.