Design and Implementation of a Triangle Energy Adaptive Thresholding Scheme for Discrete Wavelet Packet Based Wideband Spectrum Sensing in Cognitive Radio

Authors

  • Emannuel Ismaila Watila
  • Dibal Peter Yusuf
  • Stephen Bassi Joseph

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.33003/fjs-2026-1012-5152

Keywords:

Cognitive Radio, Threshold, Discrete Wavelet Packet Transform, Triangular Energy, Geometric Structure

Abstract

Cognitive radio (CR) technology addresses spectrum scarcity, but requires both speed and accuracy to be effective. Noise uncertainty often compromises sensing accuracy, while wideband sensing creates significant computational overhead that limits speed. To address these challenges, this paper introduces Triangle Energy Adaptive Thresholding (TREAT) for Discrete Wavelet Packet Transform (DWPT)-based wideband spectrum sensing. TREAT leverages the energy derived from the triangular structure of the DWPT tree to compute adaptive thresholds for sub-band channels at the terminal nodes. Performance evaluations demonstrate that TREAT reduces computational complexity by an average of 50%, resulting in faster decision times compared to conventional schemes. Furthermore, TREAT improves channel discovery by identifying 28 vacant sub-band channels compared to 26 for the reference method. In terms of sensing accuracy across the -10 dB to 10 dB SNR range, TREAT achieves a cumulative accuracy of 87.5% (17.5% mean average), outperforming the reference scheme's 81.25% cumulative accuracy (16.25% mean).

Author Biographies

  • Emannuel Ismaila Watila

    Emmanuel Watila received a Bachelor of Engineering degree from the University of Maiduguri, Borno State in 2024. He began his career as a Software Engineer in 2021, accumulating five years of experience across full-stack and applied AI engineering. His work sits at the intersection of developer tooling and clinical AI — building production systems and open-source tooling. He is currently conducting independent research in AI safety, alignment, and health AI.

  • Dibal Peter Yusuf

    DIBAL P. YUSUF received the master’s degree in electronics and communications engineering from Teesside University, U.K., in 2011, and the Ph.D. degree in communication from the Federal University of Technology Minna, in 2019. His research interests include digital signal processing, wireless reconfigurable systems, quantum computing, and VLSI architectures for signal processing and communication systems.

  • Stephen Bassi Joseph

    Stephen Bassi Joseph received his Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering (Electronics and Computer Engineering) from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, M.Eng. degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering (Electronics) from University of Maiduguri, Nigeria, and a B.Tech degree in Computer Science and Mathematics from Federal University of Technology Minna, Nigeria. His research interests are in Soft Computing Techniques, Machine learning Algorithms, Data mining, Network algorithmic, Artificial Intelligence and optimization techniques, Computer Communication Networks and Humanitarian related researches. He has published several academic papers in reputable International and local journals, conference proceedings and book chapters. He has been appointed as a reviewer of several journals such as, IEEE Access and Lecture Notes in Computer Science. He is a member of Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and Nigerian Computer Society (NCS). He is now a senior lecturer in Department of Computer Engineering, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria.

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Tasks performed by a cognitive radio

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Published

30-07-2026

Issue

Vol. 10 No. 12 (2026): FUDMA Journal of Sciences - Vol. 10 No. 12

Section

Research Articles

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Copyright (c) 2026 Emannuel Ismaila Watila, Dibal Peter Yusuf, Stephen Bassi Joseph

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

How to Cite

Watila, E. I., Yusuf, D. P., & Joseph, S. B. (2026). Design and Implementation of a Triangle Energy Adaptive Thresholding Scheme for Discrete Wavelet Packet Based Wideband Spectrum Sensing in Cognitive Radio. FUDMA JOURNAL OF SCIENCES, 10(12), 150-160. https://doi.org/10.33003/fjs-2026-1012-5152