Compensating Dynamic Nonlinearities in LED Photon Emission to Enhance Optical Wireless Communication

Shokoufeh Mardanikorani, Xiong Deng (Corresponding author), Jean Paul M.G. Linnartz, Amir Khalid

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

17 Citations (Scopus)
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Abstract

LEDs can be modulated to support wireless optical data communication. However, particularly LEDs optimized for illumination act as a non-linear low-pass communication channel. In this paper, we translate the non-linear differential equations for the hole-electron recombination and photon emissions, into a discrete-time model with delay taps and non-linear coefficients. This LED model can be inverted, to actively eliminate or mitigate the non-linear dynamic LED distortion. We propose a further simplification of the compensation circuit that allows us to use a relatively simple structure with only a couple of parameters. We experimentally characterize and measure signals communicated via commercially available illumination LEDs that are also used for LiFi communication. In an Intensity Modulation Direct Detection (IM/DD) system employing Pulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM), we show that the proposed equalizer can effectively widen the measured eye diagram, thereby reduce the error rate or can allow a larger constellation. For Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM), the reduction in distortion allows at least a 50% increase in bit rate, even on measured noisy channels. This confirms the suitability of the LED model on which our non-linear equalizer is based. We show how non-linear time-constants can be estimated from electrical measurements on the LED signal. With the proposed parameter estimation, the equalizer converges to appropriate compensation settings, in Minimum Mean Square Error (MMSE) sense.

Original languageEnglish
Article number9321170
Pages (from-to)1317-1331
Number of pages15
JournalIEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology
Volume70
Issue number2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Feb 2021

Funding

FundersFunder number
European Union's Horizon 2020 - Research and Innovation Framework Programme825651

    Keywords

    • Bandwidth
    • communication
    • illumination
    • LED
    • nonlinearity
    • VLC

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