The "Rap" on ROF: Radio over Fiber Using Radio Access Point for High Data Rate Wireless Personal Area Networks

A wireless personal area network (WPAN) allows the wireless devices in a user´s personal workspace to be connected to the network. Due to the huge increase in both the number of wireless communication subscribers and the bandwidth required per customer with the proliferation of smart devices, the low-frequency radio spectrum is becoming overcrowded. A natural solution for future WPANs is to migrate to higher radio frequency (RF) carriers [1]. High data-rate WPANs may be implemented based on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) compliant ultrawideband (UWB) standard [2] or on the IEEE 802.15.3c standard [3]. The UWB signal was defined by the FCC as a signal having a bandwidth larger than 20% of the carrier frequency or a bandwidth of at least 500 MHz in the 3.1-10.6-GHz band; IEEE 802.15.3c relies on a carrier frequency in the 60-GHz license-free industrial, scientific, and medical (ISM) band. The implementation of both the UWB standard and the IEEE 802.15.3c standard faces certain challenges, which may be tackled with the aid of radio over fiber (ROF) techniques that employ optical generation of the wireless signal. ROF networking solutions have been proposed for future high-bandwidth wireless communication systems that rely on the transmission of RF signals between the base station (BS) and remote antennas [1], [4]-[8].