Distributed Sensing Experiments Combining Monostatic and Bistatic Scattering Based on Radio Channel Measurements

Abstract

In this paper, we leverage a frequency-domain channel sounding campaign conducted in the [3–11] GHz band to assess the feasibility of radio-based sensing in distributed Integrated Sensing And Communication (ISAC) contexts. By sequentially changing the deployment setup over reproducible discrete 2D locations (accounting for a transmitting Base Station (BS) endowed with beam steering capabilities, a receiving multiantenna User Equipment (UE), and a passive human target), the channel measurements are combined offline to emulate various sensing strategies in gradually complex scenarios. The latter include multi-BS and multi-UE cooperative configurations and use monostatic backscattering on the one hand, as well as bistatic and even multistatic scattering over downlink transmissions on the other hand. The results illustrate benefits from spatially distributed multi-node sensing approaches in terms of diversity and measurement redundancy, despite heterogeneous sensing capabilities and operating conditions at the different nodes.