Optical wireless communications for broadband access in home area networks

Abstract

As a part of the EU-FP7 R&D programme, the OMEGA project (hOME Gigabit Access) aims at bridging the gap between mobile broadband terminals and the wired backbone network in homes. To provide Gb/s connectivity a combination of various technologies is considered. Beside radio frequencies, the wireless links will use infrared and visible light. Combined with power-line communications this enables a home area network (HAN) that meets the vision of broadband home networking dasiawithout new wirespsila. A technology-independent MAC layer is foreseen to control such network and to provide services as well as connectivity to any device the user wishes to connect. Moreover, this MAC layer should allow the service to follow the user from device to device in any room of a building /apartment. The contribution presents ideas and approaches for broadband optical wireless (OW) communications using infrared Gb/s hotspots and 100 Mb/s information broadcasting by means of interior lighting based on white-light LEDs. Important issues concerning the physical layer are discussed

Free space optical communication in the visible bandwidth for V2V safety critical protocols

“…Recently Optical Wireless Communication (OWC) systems have been investigated for different applications, ranging from sensing [10] to data-transmission [11]. Among OWC systems, those based on Visible Light are of particular interest for indoor environments since they can combine illumination and communication functionalities.…”

Transitioning to Hybrid Radio/Optical Networks: Development of a Flexible Visible Light Communication Testbed

“…As a result, a significant global movement toward replacing incandescent and fluorescent lights with solid state white LEDs (WLED) is underway. In addition to lighting capabilities, WLEDs could also be used to provide wireless communications by modulating the intensity of the light source faster than the human eye can perceive [14,15]. It is possible to turn any LED light fixture into a light transceiver, to serve as sources for even very high data rate applications.…”

Analytical approach on SNR performance of visible light communication for modern lighting layout

“…The LED provides larger bandwidth and high transmission speed in the wireless communication field [6]. Even though some of the technical properties of infra red are similar with the visible light, infra red application are limited due to safety and cost issues [7].…”