Free Space Optic (FSO)

EE 566 Optical Communication

Ming Li mingli@buffalo.edu

Why choose this topic?

Why still choose this topic?

September 11, 2001, New York

 Every

thing was destroyed including normal fiber link

Wall street stock market was closed because the communication was destroyed

Two of these units were used between building to re-establish a high speed communication link.

FSO

communication between Merrill Lynch Brokerage and Wall Street in New York following the terrorist attack that destroyed normal fiber optic link

History of Free Space Optics

The transmission of information using light is actually not a new idea.

Great Wall

In the late nineteenth century, Alexander Bell expanded his "phone-phone" communication which modulated by sunlight.

Birth of Laser FSO Communications

Gemini-7

In the mid-1960's NASA initiated experiments to utilize the laser as a means of communication between the ground and space.

Satellite Laser Communication

Space-to-Ground Lasercom Link 2000 km Link Distance 1 Gbps Transmission Rate

Chinese First Maned Spaceship

Military Application of FSO

Air Force Its potential for low electromagnetic emanation when transferring sensitive data

Navy Secure communication with submerged submarines.

Technology from Space Lasercom

Advantage of FSO

Wireless communicate from A to B Low costs ($10K to $20K) High bit rate (10 Mbps to 2.5 Gbps) Set up a link in a few days The lasers used are eye safe, so even a butterfly can fly unscathed through a beam

Application of FSO

Connectivity Solutions 'Last-Mile' Network Solutions Temporary Network Provision Cable Free Connectivity in the Finance Sector CCTV Security Applications GSM Microcell Connectivity

Industrial estates, Science parks and university campus environments typically exhibit a common problem a number of separate buildings, separated by roads or other obstacles, between which communications links are frequently in demand.

Cable digging, increasingly unpopular in cities, is regulated by the local authority who may restrict redigging frequency of roads - and the cost may be prohibitive in any case, especially if a river or railway is in the way.

FSO vs RF
RF 2.4 GHz systems were typically running at 2-4 Mbps due to interference issues in the unlicensed frequency ranges
FSO provided 10 Mbps of throughput for less than unlicensed RF FSO was less cost, more secure, and seemed simpler

Challenge of FSO
Challenge #1hitting the target

Challenge #2interrupted signals

Hitting the target

Getting a laser beam to hit the mark in a laboratory setting is easy, but in the real world it is much harder.
1)Atmospheric turbulence 2)Fog 3)Building movement

Atmospheric attenuation and scatter

6.5 dB/km 150 dB/km 225 dB/km

300m distance to tall building

Solution

Active beam steering (sometimes involving MEMS), Multiple laser beams, Automated power control, and calculated laser beam divergence. Pulsed laser beams start out just centimeters wide and can diverge to 1 meter or more over typical link distanceslike using a really big bullet to hit a small target.

Challenge #2 interrupted signals

An email is beaming across the FSO connection just as a bird flies through, blocking the signal.

Solution #2no lost data

No fear. FSO linkheads essentially "talk" to one another, and just as people repeat words in conversation, data can be retransmitted in the event of a temporary beam blockage. Several companies even have redundant radio-frequency links that simultaneously transmit the FSO signal. When the radio or the FSO signal is blocked, the counterpart is automatically usedno loss of data, and no delay.

Companies and rapidly advancing FSO technology

AirFiber
Hybrid Free- space optic/Radio

LightPointe

Multi-beam sending process

Terabeam

carrier-grade FSO equipment and services

AirFiber

www.airfiber.com

San Diego, California, was founded in 1998

AirFiber's products combine FSO with 60 GHz millimeterwave radio, makes wireless communication possible in any weather.

LightPointe

www.lightpointe.com San Diego, California, was founded

LightPointe's FSO products utilize a multi-beam sending process, which overcomes atmospheric degradations and temporary beam obstructions by overlapping redundant infrared beams.

Terabeam

www.terabeam.com Kirkland, Washington, was founded in 1997

Terabeam's FSO products have advanced beam-steering features that update beam direction up to 300 times per second.

Conlusion

FSO is just starting to be applied to solve the Internet last-mile interconnectivity problem. Some believe that it may be the unlimited bandwidth solution for the metro urban core of downtown building-tobuilding communication, as well as the optimal technology for home-to-home and office-to-office connectivity.

Reference
http://www.lightpointe.com/ http://www.freespaceoptic.com/ http://www.fsonews.com/ http://www.cablefreesolutions.com/ http://www.thefoa.org/ http://www.free-space-optics.org/ http://www.freespaceoptics.com/ http://www.opticsreport.com/