Researchers Develop New Wireless Communication Method Using Infrared

One thing the current pandemic has shown us is how much we rely on wireless communication. Most wireless communication is radio-based, and as our data demands grow, these signals struggle to keep up. One team of researchers believe a way to address this problem involves infrared. Eindhoven University of Technology engineers are developing new methods for wireless communication that involves infrared beams.

Ton Koonen and researchers at the Institute for Photonic Integration are designing new systems with a capacity of more than two thousand times that of current shared WiFi systems. They explain that optical wireless communications using narrow light beams has several advantages, such as being easily directable, being more energy-efficient, have lower levels of latency, better data and communication privacy, and a significantly larger capacity per user.

Indoors the beams are transported by optical fibers that come from a central communication controller (CCC). These are transmitted to intended devices using a ceiling-based pencil-radiating antenna (PRA). Though infrared communication is more energy-efficient, it requires a clear line of sight between the PRA and the receiving device. It also requires an optical receiver to detect the signal at the device. Koonen’s team has developed an optical receiver based on integrated optics technology that captures the beam using a grating. It then sends the signal along a waveguide and into a high-speed photodiode.

For the beam to locate where the user’s device is, it needs to collect data about the device’s position before sending signals. To address this, the researchers placed four visible light LEDs around the optical received on the device and a camera on the ceiling. The device is then given a unique blinking sequence of LEDs, which is recorded by the camera and analyzed with a Raspberry Pi module.

The team is still developing the system, but they believe it could be used in homes, hospitals, office buildings and other locations where wireless communication is a must. Though radio waves aren’t going anywhere soon, infrared communication could be the future of wireless communication.