Wireless communications laboratory

Wireless communications technology is one of the most rapidly growing disciplines and is experiencing unprecedented market growth. The 21st Century will witness the widespread deployment of all kinds of public and private wireless networks. Many graduating seniors and graduate students are finding themselves in careers relating to wireless information technology. In addition, practicing engineers, computer specialists, and managers have to re-educate themselves in the area of wireless technology. Polytechnic University (Brooklyn Poly), Brooklyn, NY, recognized the need to prepare its students for careers in wireless and successfully developed one of the first instructional wireless information networks laboratories. The laboratory has provided more than 800 students during the past decade with the opportunity to acquire both in-depth theoretical understanding and hands-on experience in this rapidly growing discipline. The laboratory experience can play an important role in motivating students and stimulating their interest in a specific discipline such as wireless communication systems. It both complements and supplements the other theoretical courses taken by the students. Reading about signals plus additive white Gaussian noise in a textbook and actually observing such signals in a laboratory oscilloscope can be two very different experiences for many students. This paper describes this instructional laboratory, which is replicable by other universities.