Turbulence-induced Intensity Fluctuations Research Articles

Capacity Performance Analysis for Terrestrial THz Channels

The outdoor terrestrial terahertz (THz) communication links have recently attracted great research and commercial interest in response to the emerging bandwidth-hungry demands for extremely high-speed wireless data transmissions. However, their development is hindered by the random behavior of the atmospheric channel due to the molecular attenuation, adverse weather effects, and atmospheric turbulence (along with free space path loss (FSPL) and pointing errors) due to the stochastic misalignments between the transmitter and the receiver. Thus, in this work, we investigate the joint influence of these detrimental effects on both capacities, i.e., average (ergodic) and outage, of such a typical line of sight (LOS) THz communication link. Specifically, atmospheric turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations can be modeled by using either the suitable gamma or the well-known gamma–gamma distribution for weak and moderate to strong turbulence conditions, respectively. Additionally, weak to strong stochastic misalignment-induced intensity fluctuations, due to generalized pointing errors with non-zero boresight (NZB), are emulated by the appropriate Beckman distribution. Taking into additional consideration the unavoidable presence of FSPL and the different but realistic water vapor concentration values along with the influence of weather conditions, an outage performance analysis has been conducted. Considering the abovementioned significant effects, novel analytical mathematical expressions have been extracted for both average (ergodic) and outage capacity, which are critical metrics that first incorporate the total influence of all of the above significant effects on the THz links’ performance. Through the derived expressions, proper analytical results verified by simulations are presented and demonstrate the validity of our analysis. It is notable that the derived expressions can accommodate realistic parameter values involved in all the above-mentioned major effects and link characteristics. In this context, they provide encouraging quantitative results and outcomes for both capacity metrics under investigation. The latter enables the design and the establishment of modern and future high-speed THz links, which are expected to cover longer propagation distances and thus become even more vulnerable to atmospheric turbulence effect. This is modeled and incorporated in our analysis and expressions contrary to most of the previous works in the open technical literature.

Experimental demonstration: Differential detection of 10 Gbps optical OOK signal over turbulent channel

In this paper, we experimentally demonstrate the bit error rate (BER) performance of fixed threshold differential detection for both 5 Gbps and 10 Gbps On-Off keying (OOK) signals over a turbulent channel, which induces slowly varying intensity fluctuation on the signals. The experimental results are also validated using numerical simulations. This study is significant for the terrestrial free-space optical (FSO) communication system in which the channel induces similar intensity fluctuation due to atmospheric turbulence. To show the efficiency of the differential detection scheme for the OOK signal two proof-of-principle systems are realized. In the first system, the effect of channel-induced intensity variation on the data is realized by passing a differentially coded OOK signal through a Mach–Zehnder modulator (MZM), which is driven by a low frequency sinusoidal electrical signal emulating slowly varying channel fluctuation. The amplitude of the sinusoid has been varied to create different levels of intensity fluctuation, mimicking different turbulent conditions in the optical link. In the second setup, we measure the BER performance of differential detection assisted OOK transmission over a short-range (10)m FSO channel, which is affected by turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations. The different turbulences are created by different heating levels of a blower, which injects hot air across the FSO channel. Experimental results show that in the presence of intensity fluctuation, differential detection of OOK signal using a fixed threshold offers a better BER performance at higher optical to signal ratio (OSNR) values compared to conventional direct detection (DD) scheme. Results obtained from numerical simulation of OOK transmission over turbulent FSO channels also confirm the similar behavior. Both simulation and experimental results show that differential detection can offer a BER of 10−3 at 5 Gbps and 10 Gbps data rates with slow varying channel-induced intensity fluctuation when the DD scheme fails to produce the same BER values.

Aperture Averaged Scintillation of Gaussian Beam in Strong Oceanic Turbulence

Oceanic turbulence caused by salinity and temperature fluctuations underwater affects the characteristics of a transmit laser beam resulting in turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations (i.e., scintillation) at the receiver. Oceanic optical wireless communication (OOWC) systems employ a receiver lens of aperture to focus the collected light onto a photodetector. This way, aperture averaging takes place and the scintillation on the detector is reduced. Using the modified Rytov theory, aperture averaged scintillation of the Gaussian beam passing through strong oceanic turbulence is examined in this study. Effects of Gaussian beam parameters and the turbulence parameters on the aperture averaged scintillation and the aperture averaging factor are illustrated. The scintillation behaviors of the limiting cases of a spherical wave and a plane wave are also reported. Results show that aperture averaged scintillation decreases with increasing the size of the receiver aperture for any turbulence level. The effect of Gaussian size on the aperture averaged scintillation varies depends on the turbulence level. It is also shown that there is a close match between the point scintillation index values obtained from the modified Rytov theory and the conventional Rytov theory in low levels of turbulence.

Bit-error-rate performance of non-line-of-sight UV transmission with spatial diversity reception

In non-line-of-sight (NLOS) UV communication links using intensity modulation with direct detection, atmospheric turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations can significantly impair link performance. To mitigate turbulence-induced fading and, therefore, to improve the bit error rate (BER) performance, spatial diversity reception can be used over NLOS UV links, which involves the deployment of multiple receivers. The maximum-likelihood (ML) spatial diversity scheme is derived for spatially correlated NLOS UV links, and the influence of various fading correlation at different receivers on the BER performance is investigated. For the dual-receiver case, ML diversity detection is compared with equal gain combining and optimal combining schemes under different turbulence intensity conditions.

Communication techniques and coding for atmospheric turbulence channels

In free-space optical communication links, atmospheric turbulence causes fluctuations in both the intensity and the phase of the received light signal, impairing link performance. In this paper, we describe several communication techniques to mitigate turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations, i.e., signal fading. These techniques are applicable in the regime in which the receiver aperture is smaller than the correlation length of the fading, and the observation interval is shorter than the correlation time of the fading. We assume that the receiver has no knowledge of the instantaneous fading state. The techniques we consider are based on the statistical properties of fading, as functions of both temporal and spatial coordinates. Our approaches can be divided into two categories: temporal domain techniques and spatial domain techniques. In the spatial domain techniques, one must employ at least two receivers to collect the signal light at different positions or from different spatial angles. Spatial diversity reception with multiple receivers can be used to overcome turbulence-induced fading. When it is not possible to place the receivers sufficiently far apart, the fading at different receivers is correlated, reducing the diversity gain. We describe a ML detection technique to reduce the diversity gain penalty caused by such fading correlation. In the temporal domain techniques, one employs a single receiver. When the receiver knows only the marginal statistics of the fading, a symbol-by-symbol ML detector can be used to optimize performance. When the receiver also knows the temporal correlation of the fading, maximum-likelihood sequence detection (MLSD) can be employed, yielding a further performance improvement, but at the cost of very high complexity. We describe two reduced-complexity implementations of the MLSD, which make use of a single-step Markov chain model for the fading correlation in conjunction with per-survivor processing. Next, we also investigate the performance of using error-control coding and pilot symbol-assisted detection schemes through atmospheric turbulence channels.

PCCC for the performance improvement of the wireless optical communication system

In wireless optical communication, effects of scintillation make average Bit Error Rate (BER) deteriorate. To improve system performance, PCCC (Parallel Concatenated Convolutional Code) encoding scheme is employed, and upper bound on the bit error rate is given by considering the effects of scintillation, APD noise and thermal noise. Simulation results show that the PCCC encoding scheme can relieve turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations and the system performance is improved remarkably.

Mitigation of turbulence-induced scintillation noise in free-space optical links using temporal-domain detection techniques

Atmospheric turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations can significantly impair the performance of free-space optical links. Temporal-domain detection techniques can be applied to mitigate these intensity fluctuations. If the receiver has knowledge of the joint temporal statistics of intensity fluctuations, maximum-likelihood sequence detection (MLSD) or pilot-symbol assisted detection (PSAD) can be employed. We experimentally demonstrate the effectiveness of these techniques in a 500-m terrestrial link using ON-OFF keying, where MLSD and PSAD yield signal-to-noise ratio gains of 2.4 and 1.9 dB, respectively.

Markov chain model in maximum-likelihood sequence detection for free-space optical communication through atmospheric turbulence channels

In free-space optical communication links using intensity modulation and direct detection (IM/DD), atmospheric turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations can significantly impair link performance. Communication techniques can be applied to mitigate turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations (i.e., signal fading) in the regime in which the receiver aperture D/sub 0/ is smaller than the fading correlation length d/sub 0/ and the observation interval T/sub 0/ is smaller than the fading correlation time /spl tau//sub 0/. If the receiver has knowledge of the joint temporal statistics of the fading, maximum-likelihood sequence detection (MLSD) can be employed, but at the cost of high computational complexity. We introduce a single-step Markov chain (SMC) model for the fading correlation and use it to derive two low-complexity, suboptimal MLSD algorithms based on per-survivor processing (PSP). Simulations are presented to verify the SMC model and the performance improvement achieved using these suboptimal per-survivor processing (PSP) algorithms.

Free-space optical communication through atmospheric turbulence channels

In free-space optical communication links, atmospheric turbulence causes fluctuations in both the intensity and the phase of the received light signal, impairing link performance. We describe several communication techniques to mitigate turbulence-induced intensity fluctuations, i.e., signal fading. These techniques are applicable in the regime in which the receiver aperture is smaller than the correlation length of fading and the observation interval is shorter than the correlation time of fading. We assume that the receiver has no knowledge of the instantaneous fading state. When the receiver knows only the marginal statistics of the fading, a symbol-by-symbol ML detector can be used to improve detection performance. If the receiver has knowledge of the joint temporal statistics of the fading, maximum-likelihood sequence detection (MLSD) can be employed, yielding a further performance improvement, but at the cost of very high complexity. Spatial diversity reception with multiple receivers can also be used to overcome turbulence-induced fading. We describe the use of ML detection in spatial diversity reception to reduce the diversity gain penalty caused by correlation between the fading at different receivers.

Measurement of Atmospheric Turbulence Induced Intensity Fluctuations in a Laser Beam

We report measurements of the statistical properties of the intensity fluctuations in a He/Ne laser beam which had propagated 1·125 km through the earth's atmosphere. The beam size was such that the beam propagated as a spherical wave, and atmospheric conditions such that most measurements were made in the ‘saturation’ region (β0 ∼ 1-4). We found (1) that the variance of the intensity was considerably larger than that previously reported for plane wave propagation, and (2) that the probability distribution of the intensity and the derived moments were close to the K-distribution and its moments. The origin and significance of the K-distribution in atmospheric propagation is considered. Photon counting techniques were used for all measurements.