

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has announced their upcoming challenge to RF hackers: can you program a radio to dominate the spectrum everywhere? DARPA describes the challenge:

The DARPA Spectrum Challenge is a competition to demonstrate a radio protocol that can best use a given communication channel in the presence of other dynamic users and interfering signals. The Challenge is not focused on developing new radio hardware, but instead is targeted at finding strategies for guaranteeing successful communication in the presence of other radios that may have conflicting co-existence objectives. The Spectrum Challenge will entail head-to-head competitions between your radio protocol and an opponent’s in a structured testbed environment. In addition to bragging rights for the winning teams, one team could win as much as $150,000.

DAPRA says registration for the Spectrum Challenge is expected to officially open in January 2013. Any U.S. academic institution, business, or individual, is eligible to compete, with certain restrictions. Visit the Spectrum Challenge page for more details.