Ris work has beenperformed in theframework of the ISTpmjecr IST-2001-34091 SCOUT, which is pan& funded by the Europeon Union. The authon would like IO acknowledge the ontnbu lions of theircolleopes. ABSTRACT Reconfigurahlc radio in Europe is rapidly gaining momentum and becoming a key enabler for realizing the vision of hcing optimally connected anywhere, anytime. At the center of this exciting technology is thc reconfigurahle terminal that will move across different radio access networks,

more »

... ing at every instant to an optimum mode of operation. This will require coordinated reconfiguration management support from both the terminal and the network, hut the terminal will inherit a significant part of this intelligence. This article focuses o n a novel reconfigurable terminal architecture that advances the state of the art and encompasses the overall protocol stack from the physical to application layer in IP-based radio access networks. The proposed architecture is composed of a terminal reconfiguration management part and enabling middleware technologies like the complementary Distributed Processing Environment and agent platforms, flexible protocol stacks that can flexibly he interchanged to support different wireless technologies and associated mechanisms, and finally, object-oriented reconfigurahlc RF and baseband components. The work presented in this article is conducted in the context of the IST projects SCOUT (www. ist-scout.org) and TRUST (www4.in.tum.de/ -scoutitrust-webpage-src/ trust-frameset.html) of the Europcan 5th Framework Program.