The technique, called time domain transmit beamforming, digitally creates a time domain cancellation signal and couples it to the radio frequency frontend to allow the radio to hear much weaker incoming signals.
According to Professors Yingbo Hua and Ping Liang (pictured), it does this while still transmitting strong outgoing signals at the same frequency and time.
"The solution is indispensable for a full duplex radio, while still being complementary to other required solutions or components," Prof Liang noted. "It not only has a sound theoretical proof, t also leads to a lower cost, faster and more accurate channel estimation for robust and effective cancellation."
Liang and Hua believe the research has commercial potential in part because most of the core components required are digital, eliminating the need for costly new components to be added to existing infrastructure.
The researchers see immediate application in mobile phone masts, as well as in cognitive radio - a type of wireless communication in which a transceiver can detect which communication channels are in use and which are not, and move into vacant channels while avoiding occupied ones.
