In order to mitigate the interference for macrocell users caused by deploying femtocells （home base-station） in a long term evolution （LTE） system, a hybrid spectrum access model is proposed by means of applying the cognitive radio technology to the femtocell. The femtocell periodically senses the radio environment and opportunistically accesses the usable frequency band so that the frequency spectrum resource is used intelligently. The sensing process is performed in two stages, which are principal sensing in the downlink and assisted sensing in the uplink, respectively. Based on the information obtained from the sensing results, the frequency spectrum can be used flexibly in underlay or overlay modes in the femtocell. Simulation results show that by using the proposed model, the throughput of a femtocell is greatly improved with tolerable interference to macrocell users.
