Optimal Waveform Design for UWB Radios

Realizing the benefits of ultra-wideband (UWB) communications hinges critically on judicious pulse shape design to enable UWB spectral mask compatibility, and co-existence with and adaptation to other wireless devices. To this end, we propose a convex optimization based waveform design method for UWB radios. By casting the pulse design problem as a (convex) semidefinite program (SDP) over the pulse autocorrelation, globally optimal waveform designs can be efficiently obtained. While the focus of this paper is on the design of waveforms that optimally utilize the bandwidth and power allowed by the spectral mask, the flexibility of the SDP framework also allows the optimization of several other system objectives.