Automated Radio Evaluation Suite

The Automated Radio Evaluation Suite (ARES) enables automated RF measurements for power amplifiers and antennas, interfacing seamlessly with existing laboratory equipment using standard communication protocols and offering a comprehensive and user-friendly interface. Unlike commercial software, this app is open-source, customizable, and free. Download the latest release and follow the Getting Started guide to learn how to use it. Tutorials for Instrument Database, Antenna Measurement, and PA Measurements are available. All the documentation is hosted on Read the Docs.

Features

• VISA-based instrument control via GPIB, LAN, and USB
• Support for multiple ETS-Lindgren, Keysight, and Rohde & Schwarz instruments
• Built in deembedding support and DC power supply control
• Measure RF power amplifier Figures of Merit (FoM) over one or multiple frequencies
  • Gain
  • Output Power
  • Drain Efficiency
  • Power Added Efficiency
• Measure and visualize 2D/3D antenna realized and absolute gain characteristics by:
  • Gain Comparison Method (i.e., Two-Antenna Method)
  • Gain Transfer Method (i.e., Comparison Antenna Method) using a reference measurement
• Measure antenna return loss (magnitude and phase).
• Save and recall measurements in standardized file formats for data analysis.
• Plot measurement results within the app for quick visualization.
• Export plots to PDF, PNG, JPEG, and TikZ for publication (TikZ export is unsupported for polar plots).

TODO

• Update Documentation Images: Showing new UI and plotting options.
• Object Oriented Instruments: Configure a class for each instrument to execute the commands instead of hardcoding. This should allow different classes to be configured for specific command sets or special cases on particular instruments.
• Instrument Type Filter: Filter the instrument address dropdown by instrument type and only display the instruments pertaining relevant category and 'Others'.
• PA Test Safety Features: Add option to stop test if power supply is current limited (short circuit).
• Test Configuration: Save and load test parameters with custom configurations and unique app settings with a JSON file.
• Over the Air Testing (OTA): Measure RF transceivers (PAs, Antennas, LNAs, etc.) with modulated signals and plot the results. Enable measurements with the presence of interferers.
• Known Limitation: The linear slider range and offset are hard-coded in the app. The default values are for Purdue's Anechoic Chamber setup (2m slider range and offset 0.8062m). You can modify the LINEAR_SLIDER_RANGE and offsetSpacing variables in ARES.MLAPP to fit a different setup. This could be added to the instrument database as properties.

Usage

Installing ARES

Instrumnet Database Tutorial

PA Measurement Tutorial

Antenna Measurement Tutorial

Contributions

• Author: José Abraham Bolaños Vargas (@bolanosv)
• Mentor: Alex David Santiago Vargas (@AlexDCode, Google Scholar)
• PI: Dimitrios Peroulis (Google Scholar)
• Adaptive Radio Electronics and Sensors Group
• Purdue University

Acknowledgments

This project makes use of several open-source tools. The authors acknowledge the following:

• matlab2tikz for enabling high-quality $\LaTeX$-compatible plot exports. Copyright (c) 2008--2016 Nico Schlömer. All rights reserved.

E. Geerardyn, N. Schlömer, et. al. (2025). "matlab2tikz: Version 1.1.0". Zenodo, Oct. 20, 2016. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.162246.