ECE 5377/7377

Lectures, Labs, and Project Deadlines

Fall 2026

Meeting Time: Fridays, 9:00 AM to 11:50 AM

Meeting Location: Autonomous Drone Teaming Lab, 5538 Dyer Street

This schedule is designed around a once-per-week integrated lecture and laboratory format. Each Friday meeting will typically include lecture, discussion, demonstrations, and lab/project support. Readiness quizzes are intended to prepare students for the upcoming lab rather than function as separate traditional homework assignments.
Week Date Theme Lecture Topics Assignment Released Due
1 Aug. 28 SDR Environment Course logistics; wireless system overview; SDR philosophy; MATLAB; GNU Radio; UHD; USRP N310 architecture; remote laboratory access; project overview. Lab 1: MATLAB, GNU Radio, Remote Access, N310 Familiarization Sept. 4
2 Sept. 4 Information & Signals Information theory; Shannon capacity; entropy; spectral efficiency; wireless standards; signal representations. Readiness Quiz 1 Sept. 11
3 Sept. 11 Spectrum & Signal Analysis Random variables; random processes; noise; FFT; power spectral density; spectrum measurements; measured versus ideal signals. Lab 2: Signal Generation, FFT, PSD, Spectrum Measurements Sept. 25
4 Sept. 18 Sampling & Pulse Shaping Sampling theorem; aliasing; interpolation; decimation; pulse shaping; raised-cosine filtering; matched filtering. Readiness Quiz 2 Sept. 25
5 Sept. 25 Digital Modulation & Detection PAM, PSK, and QAM; constellation normalization; symbol energy; Euclidean distance detection; BER and SER; measured constellation behavior. Lab 3: Digital Modulation, BER, Constellation Measurements Oct. 9
6 Oct. 2 Wireless Channels & Fading Path loss; multipath; delay spread; Doppler; flat fading; frequency-selective fading; narrowband and wideband channel models. Readiness Quiz 3 Oct. 9
7 Oct. 9 Synchronization Frame synchronization; timing recovery; correlation-based packet detection; carrier frequency offset; phase recovery. Lab 4: Packet Detection & Synchronization Oct. 23
8 Oct. 16 Channel Estimation & Equalization Training sequences; least-squares channel estimation; MMSE concepts; FIR equalization; decision-feedback equalization; equalization performance. Readiness Quiz 4 Oct. 23
9 Oct. 23 OFDM DFT and FFT; cyclic prefix; subcarriers; pilot tones; frequency-domain equalization; OFDM impairments. Lab 5: OFDM Transceiver & Equalization Nov. 6
10 Oct. 30 Diversity & MIMO Fundamentals Receive diversity; selection combining; equal-gain combining; maximum-ratio combining; SIMO; Alamouti concepts; MIMO motivation. Readiness Quiz 5 Nov. 6
11 Nov. 6 Beamforming & Spatial Multiplexing MIMO channel model; channel matrix measurement; capacity; beamforming; spatial multiplexing; zero-forcing detection. Lab 6: MIMO Measurements & Performance Evaluation Nov. 20
12 Nov. 13 Modern Wireless Systems & Project Workshop LTE, 5G, and Wi-Fi PHY overview; standards perspective; optional OAI reference design discussion; optional AI-assisted wireless signal processing examples; project mentoring. Project Milestone: Project progress check and preliminary results Nov. 20
13 Nov. 20 Project Work Day Lab 6 wrap-up; project debugging; instructor and TA consultations; presentation preparation. Project work Lab 6 and Project Milestone
— Nov. 27 Thanksgiving Holiday No class. — —
14 Dec. 4 Project Presentations Final project presentations and course synthesis. Final Presentation Final Report due during finals week (12/13 by 11:59 pm)
Optional Engineering Outreach Challenge: Students may produce a 60 to 120 second public video explaining a project or course experiment. Upon satisfactory completion by the project due date, students may choose either to drop their lowest Readiness Quiz grade or receive +5 points on the semester project.

This schedule is best-effort as of the beginning of the semester and subject to change according to the time available in the semester, laboratory readiness, equipment availability, and project needs.