Implementation of an ADS-B/Mode-S Receiver in GNU Radio

Application Note Number

AN-363

Revision History

Date	Author	Details
2016-05-01	Nate Temple	Initial creation

Abstract

This AN guides the reader through the implementation of an ADS-B receiver using the gr-air-modes Out-of-Tree (OOT) module for GNU Radio. An explanation of ADS-B is also provided, and several real-world, over-the-air examples and profiled.

Overview

The Ettus Research™ USRP™ (Universal Software Radio Peripheral) is used for a number of military and aerospace applications. In this example, the USRP N200/N210 is used to receive and decode Mode-S beacons from real-world aircraft. The information from these beacons is displayed on Google Earth. This demonstration shows the flexibility offered by GNU Radio, an a open source package and its strong user-base.

The Gnuradio Out-Of-Tree module (OOT) gr-air-modes will be use to receive Mode-S with the USRP.

Requirements

• Python >= 2.5
• NumPy and SciPy
• Gnuradio >= 3.5.0
• Ettus UHD >= 3.4.0
• SQLite 3.7 or later
• CMake 2.6 or later

Installation

   $ git clone https://github.com/bistromath/gr-air-modes.git
   $ cd gr-air-modes/
   $ mkdir build
   $ cd build
   $ cmake ../
   $ make
   $ sudo make install
   $ sudo ldconfig

Usage

After successfully building and installing the gr-air-modes OOT, you will have two applications to receive Mode-S.

• modes_rx
  • Command line based, textual output of data received

• modes_gui
  • GUI based interface with Google Maps integration

Additional Resources

For additional information on gr-air-modes please see the gr-air-modes Github Repository.