ITEE Innovation Expo 2008 : Project Details

Build a software based AM radio receiver

A software defined radio receiver implements the demodulation of received signals in software. This arrangement provides the ability for a single receiver to accommodate multiple modulation schemes for different channels or the option of changing the modulation scheme used on a single channel in synchronisation with the transmitter.</P>

Building a software defined AM radio allows an investigation of the technologies required to implement a software defined radio in a simplified millieu. The relatively low frequency of broadcast AM radio allows the design of a hardware solution without resorting to specialised high frequency design techniques or components. The simplicity of amplitude modulation allows investigation into demodulation signal processing technologies that can target low-cost, commercial, off-the-shelf processing solutions.

This thesis merges signal processing demodulation technologies implemented in software with a custom hardware platform to produce a functional radio receiver capable of demodulating amplitude modulated channels in the broadcast AM band.</P>