Re-defining software (defined) radio: Re-configurable radio systems and networks

The potential of Software Radio (SR) has been slow to materialize. Born out of the spoils of the Cold War, the SR concept has remained prisoner of its origin, mainly focused on the terminal, and still under considerable milit ary influence. Such narrow perspective does not fit with our long held conv iction that SR has far-reaching potential, and much broader application. Wh ile some saw it as "simply" freeing us from standards, by allowing the defi nition of the radio terminal in software (hence Software Defined Radio, SDR ), we sec it as changing not only the way we think radio systems and networ ks, but also the way we define and provide the services and adapt the appli cations that ran on top of them. We discuss here this much broader, all enc ompassing approach. While the "canonical" SDR approach concentrates on the terminal side, ours covers the whole system, extending through the network into service creation and application development. Instead of settling for defining the radio in software, we envision Re-configuring on demand not on ly the terminal but also the serving network(s) and the services they provi de (hence Re-configurable Radio Systems and Networks). To illustrate aspect s of this novel approach, we discuss past and ongoing research in Europe on Re-configurable Radio Systems and Networks, and identify areas requiring f urther attention.