Going Towards Discretized Spectrum Space: Quantification of Spectrum Consumption Spaces and a Quantified Spectrum Access Paradigm

Dynamic spectrum sharing approach is a paradigm shift from the conventional static and exclusive approach to spectrum allocation. The existing methodologies to define use of the spectrum and quantify its efficiency are based on the static spectrum assignment paradigm and not suitable for the dynamic spectrum sharing paradigm. There is a need to separately quantify the spectrum consumed by the individual transmitters and receivers when multiple heterogeneous wireless networks are sharing the spectrum in time, space, and frequency dimensions. By discretizing the spectrum dimensions, we define a methodology for quantifying the spectrum consumption spaces. This is an attempt to adopt the discretized signal processing principle and apply it to spectrum management functions that would bring in simplicity, flexibility, and precision among other advantages.