Diffuse Infrared Personal optical wireless based on modified OFDM/OQAM

Infrared personal optical wireless (POW) refers to use of free-space propagation of infrared for short range communications in an indoor context. POW offers several advantages over radio technologies, making it an attractive solution for home networks. Orthogonal modulations such as OFDM are currently used in many radio transmission standards. Among these modulations, OFDM/OQAM is an interesting alternative to classical OFDM, as it does not require the use of guard interval and it has an optimal spectral efficiency. In this paper, over a diffuse infrared channel based on experimental measurements, and with a modified scheme adaptable to optical system constraints, we investigate the combination of OFDM/OQAM and POW technology. Using intensity modulation and direct detection, we show that our modified OFDM/OQAM system increases the bit rate of POW communications, mitigates the effects of inter symbol interference (ISI), and could outperform conventional OFDM schemes with cyclic-prefix.