Characterization of UWB Propagation from 2 to 8 GHz in a Residential Environment

Previous UWB channel characterizations have been reported for various frequency bands predominantly for office environments. We present residential characterizations from 2 to 8 GHz, covering the spectrum under consideration by the FCC for UWB overlay systems. A high degree of multipath fragmentation was found in the NLOS paths (about five times that of LOS). A mean of 7 paths for LOS and 35 paths for NLOS within 10 dBof the peak return path, with a standard deviation of 5 and 30 paths respectively. The percentage of total energy found within the 10 dB threshold was 64 % for NLOS, and 69 % for LOS. This indicates that UWBreceivers must be very effective at gathering up multipath energy, especially for NLOS channels. Other channel characteristics examined include path loss exponent, shadow fading, mean excess delay and RMS delay spread. We present results for both complex baseband analysis as well as real passband (pulse based) analysis. Finally, measurements from dual receive antennas are analyzed to give spatial correlation of scattering for the UWB channel