INDOOR OPTICAL WIRELESS INTEGRATED WITH WHITE

LED LIGHTING: PERSPECTIVE & CHALLENGE

Jian Chen1, Changyuan Yu2, ZixiongWang3, Jianhua Shen1, Yuhui Li1
1. School of InfoComm Eng., Nanjing University of Posts & Telecommunications, 66 Xinmofan Road, Nanjing, China 210003
2. Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National University of Singapore, 4 Engineering Drive 3, Singapore 117576
3. School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering,Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 637553

Keywords: Visible Light Communication, White LED, fit into popular internet-of-things networks. However,
Lighting, Optical Wireless practical services may not be coming so soon as there are lots
of challenging issues waiting to be resolved [6]. In this talk
Abstract we focus on discussing VLC advantages and limitations from
both component and system level, on the purpose to make it
Trends in integrating communication functionality to clear what people have to overcome before VLC is widely
complement existing services by next-generation energy- deployed for applications of everyday life.
saving white LED lighting are reviewed. Challenges at
component and system level are discussed to enable visible 2 Supporting issues of optical wireless
light communication a practical service provision
infrastructure. To satisfy ever-increasing bandwidth demands, service
providers never stop improving their telecom infrastructure,
1 Introduction which is mainly composed of high capacity optical
transmission network as trunk and radio frequency (RF)
With attempts to counter global warming effects while not wireless network as the most popular access solution.
slowing down the development of world economy, green However, there are lots of concerns, which might affect the
technology innovations have been widely embraced in the dominance of RF wireless connection. Firstly, carrier
research and development communities. High-brightness frequency should move up to 80 GHz for more and more
white light emitting diode (HB-WLED) is thus consistently wide bandwidth. Although there is no medical testimony to
developed and widely considered to replace the existing show such RF radiation is harmful to health, some people are
incandescent and fluorescent bulbs as a strong energy-saving uneasy with this and think they are living in a weak
candidate in the lighting industry. Although its brightness and microwave oven environment. Such thought already has some
illumination efficiency should be further improved, influence on their mental health and will limit the popularity
Governments such as China have issued their roadmap to of high frequency RF mobile service. Secondly, a modernized
phase out incandescent light bulbs within several years. On home is always deployed with lots of sensors and robotic
the other hand, as early as in 2000 a group of Japanese mechanisms. Most of them rely on wireless connectivity by
scientists already pioneered to implement optical wireless applying unregulated spectrum from a great deal of different
transmission with this kind of WLED connected with power vendors. Although electromagnetic interference (EMI) is not
line communication facilities to shine data with light[1]. a problem for individual product, it may not be avoided to
During the following past ten years, optical indoor wireless show false alarming as an annoying nightmare because of
communication with WLED got increasingly interests from interference. Whats more, healthcare inside home wards will
not only academic research institutes and universities but also introduce lots of medical sensors, which will not welcome the
industrial bodies. From the European OMEGA project [2], the coexistence of other RF radiation in some cases. It could be
current reported transmission record in single wavelength dangerous to ignore RF interference and so mobile services
channel is up to 500Mbps [3] and in WDM channel is 803 are often prohibited in the ICU of a hospital. Thirdly,
Mbits[4], contributed by SIMENS and HHI respectively. although digital encryption over WLAN could basically
Standardization organizations have worked on relevant satisfy the requirements for home privacy and security, it is
standards, such as the published international standards of not a 100 percent warranty of protection. Further, it can be
IEEE 802.15.7 and domestic standards from VLCC, Japan [5], imagined that indoor optical wireless can be advantageous to
etc. Optical wireless integrated with WLED lighting is now secure field camps for civil defence service. The U.S.
officially referred to as visible light communication (VLC) government controls related products for exportation purpose.
and currently it seems to be deployed for practical There is no difference for home users in some cases to
applications, especially for indoor environments and ultimately secure their communications, etc.
intelligent transport systems (ITS). Whats more, it can be Digital optical wireless is a possible choice to avoid the
expected to see lighting, communication, sensing networks abovementioned concerns. It has no RF electromagnetic
incorporated into one physical infrastructure and to perfectly radiation and offers ultra-wide unregulated spectrum
(500nm~1500nm). Optical wireless makes Gbps base-band
transmission very easy through the use of CWDM and/or
space division multiplexing in the short range. Its
controversial inherent physical confinement makes no signal
leakage outside a room. Although some people may have
concerns on its mobility or small coverage, it is very suitable
for a home office application. Interference among such
products inside the same room can be avoided in the near
future, until wavelength exhausts and channels are densely
packed in the wavelength spectra. Moreover, optical wireless
may also have lots of other attractive features for future
homes. It may have the possibility of providing all-optical
wireless extension of FTTH for the last several meters
without optical to high frequency RF conversion, which could
then greatly reduce subscriber cost.
3 System level challenging issues
For a VLC receiver, sensitivity requirement makes a
detector size of the magnitude up to 1 cm2 with large
capacitance, which results in difficulties to design the TIA
circuitry for Gbps transmission. A bulky concentrator can
moderately reduce this size, but only a multi-sectional
detector is preferable. It is thus possible to implement a
MIMO VLC system with higher rate while cost and
complicated signal processing could be an issue, especially
when the channel matrix is abnormal. Besides, it is very
difficult to consider the stylish room lighting design, the
requirement of adequate illumination across the room and
optimal VLC channel model all together. The uplink scheme
is an issue as WLED cannot be chosen because of the near-
far problem. RF or infrared uplink is an unavoidable choice
but it regains a set of problems, such as infrared power limit,
EMI, RF security concern, and so on. A VLC link is turned
off as its embedded light bulb is off, unless an infrared
downlink backup is idle. In the intelligent lighting system,
PWM is often applied to adjust the bulb luminance and then
VLC link is a burst mode communication existing during the
period of instantaneous light ON status. To dim the light
means to reduce the VLC transmission rate as the duration of
light ON is decreased. If the most popular DMT or OFDM
modulation format is applied, the non-coherent modulated
signal bandwidth is doubled to embarrassed the very limited
WLED bandwidth of only several MHz for high bit rate
transmission up to Gbps. As VLC is possibly becoming a
practical part of the access network, it should be deeply
thought how to interconnect among FTTH, PLC and VLC
together for a perfect access solution.
4 Component level challenging issues
A big problem for the VLC community is the bulb is not
for us. The large junction capacitance of WLED limits its
practical modulation ability and thus restricts its bandwidth. It
is not the VLC engineers who design and fabricate WLED
devices, but those in the lighting community who dont care
much about this parameter and even the cut-off frequency.
Besides, engineers in the lighting industry may also worry
about the residual flicker from WLED and its lifetime
deterioration, even if its modulation is only a small amount. It
is the mission for VLC experts to intervene in the WLED
bulb standardization from the lighting community, so that the
device can be redesigned for VLC-ready purpose before its
mass production and deployment. On the other hand,
phosphorescent WLED is worse in modulation bandwidth
without the blue-filtering method. If it can imagine that a
novel WLED device can be developed with only blue portion
is modulated, the performance of a VLC link can be greatly
improved and the total link capacity can be multiplied with
visible light WDM technologies.
In conclusion, the prospect and challenge of VLC based
on WLED is reviewed. From both component and system
level of view, lots of technical, standardization or even
political issues should be resolved before its mass production
for deployment and provision of services.
References
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optical transmission with the white colored LED for the
wireless home links, PIMRC 2000, London, US, pp.
1325-1329, (2000).
[2] ICT OMEGA project, http://www.ict-omega.eu.
[3] J. Vui, C. Kottke, S. Nerreter, K. Langer, and J. W.
Walewski. 513 Mbit/s Visible Light Communications
Link Based on DMT-Modulation of a White LED, J.
Lightwave Technol., 28, pp. 35123518 (2010).
[4] J. VuL, C. Kottke, K. Habel, and K. Langer. 803
Mbit/s Visible Light WDM Link based on DMT
Modulation of a Single RGB LED Luminary, OFC
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http://www.vlcc.net/.
[6] D.C. OBrien, L. Zeng, H. Le-Minh, G. Faulkner, J.W.
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