Wireless Personal Communications

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11277-019-06617-2

Certain Investigation on Visible Light Communication

with OFDM Modulated White LED Using Optisystem
Simulation

S. Selvendran1 · A. Sivanantha Raja2 · K. Esakki Muthu3 · A. Lakshmi4

© Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2019

Abstract
Visible light communication (VLC) has drawn more attention in recent years. It is due
to the reason that the existing light sources for lighting application in home, office and
streets have huge amount of bandwidth and they can deliver data communication at higher
bit rates. Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) modulation has also sig-
nificant impact on communication sector now-a-days due to its healthiness to the signal
distortion and support for higher data rate. In this paper we have studied the VLC system
using Optisystem simulation tool for an already practically measured free space channel.
White LED is used as source for our VLC system and it is driven by OFDM modulated
signal. The arrangement of this system is analysed for various bit rates and link ranges. The
proposed system can support 10 Gbps data rate up to 2 m link range. We have also studied
the OFDM subcarrier impact on system performance and link range. The performance of
designed system is compared based on its BER and constellation diagram.

Keywords  Visible light communication (VLC) · Orthogonal frequency division

multiplexing (OFDM) · White LED · Free space optics (FSO) · Bit error rate (BER)

1 Introduction

Optical wireless technology is considered as an attractive alternative to radios for wireless

communication. An entirely new trend of optical communication systems are being devel-
oped using visible light communication (VLC). In VLC, data transmission occurs using
the visible light with the frequency range of 400–700 THz. VLC depends on lighting and
it is highly suitable for environmental settings where lights are always on, such as large

* S. Selvendran
selvendrans@aol.com
1
CVR College of Engineering, Ibrahimpatnam (M), Rangareddy (D), Telangana, India
2
Alagappa Chettiar Government College of Engineering and Technology, Karaikudi, Tamilnadu,
India
3
University VOC College of Engineering, Tuticorin, Tamilnadu, India
4
Kalasalingam Academy of Research and Education (KARE), Krishnan Koil, Tamilnadu, India

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offices, production facilities, medical areas or public transport systems including cabins in
airplanes. The most recent advancement in VLC is the Li-Fi technology and it is used in
applications such as indoor navigation [1, 2], ad-hoc networking, advertising, messaging,
etc. The appealing advantages of VLC are unregulated visible EM spectrum, high band-
width, high security, harmless to humans, energy saving, robust to electromagnetic inter-
ference (EMI) and simple infrastructure requirements.
The early form of VLC included heliographs, beacon fires, light houses and Morse
codes. The first VLC demonstrated was Bell’s photophone which used sunlight as optical
source and used vibrating mirror for modulation. The LEDs have emerged as ideal opti-
cal sources for VLC due to their low cost, larger availability, good efficiency, low power
requirement and easy handling. Also, they can be formed into arrays for transmission
across larger area of cross section and thus they can exhibit enormous scalability. Apart
from p–i–n and avalanche photodiodes for detection in VLC, bidirectional LEDs can also
be used since they function as transceivers.
In an optical communication system, modulation of transmitted signal can be done in
different ways such as phase/frequency, polarization, or intensity modulation. Intensity
modulation is advantageous due to its ease of implementation. The direct-detection method
used for detection of intensity modulated signals has reduced sensitivity, and has greater
noise vulnerability compared to its counterparts. Some of the frequently employed modu-
lation schemes in conjunction with LED wireless systems are on–off keying, PCM (pulse
code modulation), and SC-BPSK (sub-carrier binary phase shift keying) [3]. A low power
and less complex systems based on on–off keying modulation have been constructed for
applications having low data rate using bidirectional LEDs [4]. VLC results achieved by
using on–off keying method are data rates of 125 Mbps (low-cost components) and 230
Mbps (APD photodiode). A less complex LED-to-LED communication system for VLC
has been demonstrated [5] with high frequency modulation. An indoor wireless Transmis-
sion rate of 19.2 kbps has been reported using a panel of red, green, and blue LEDs [6]. A
combination of power line communication (PLC) and white LED for providing broadband
access primarily for indoor applications [7] is also reported. Interestingly real-time video
streaming with data transmission rates up to 130 Mbps has been reported using white LED
[8].
Initially multiple transmitters are involved simultaneously to avoid shadowing effects
and presence of path difference in the receiver. OFDM [9] is an ideal and alternate modula-
tion technique due to its inherent robustness against multipath effects. The primary disad-
vantage of OFDM based system is the characteristic high crest factor of the time domain
signal. This requires a transmitter with a high dynamic range in conventional RF based sys-
tems and thus ending up with reduced power efficiency. An intensity modulation scheme
using OFDM is demonstrated with high crest factor for a distance close to 1 m with BER
of ­10−3 [10]. The modulation technique using coded OFDM (COFDM) with quadrature
phase shift keying (QPSK) modulation using a single LED is demonstrated to have a BER
of 2 times 1­ 0−5 [11]. Afgani et al. [12] reported a VLC system, Where OFDM is used for
intensity modulation. And they discussed the performance of the system even in the case of
high PAR [12]. The prototype system had managed a distance close to 1 m with an impres-
sive bit error rate of ­10−3 under the moderate ambient light conditions found indoors. In
this paper, we study the VLC system with OFDM modulated white LED as a source for a
practically measured free space channel [13]. This VLC system performance is measured
for the different bit rates and link distances. The performance parameters such as BER and

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Certain Investigation on Visible Light Communication with…

constellation diagrams are also discussed. This paper is organized as follows. In Sect. 2, the
experimental setup of OFDM modulated White LED based VLC system is described. Sec-
tion 3 discusses the results, and conclusion is given in Sect. 4.

2 Experimental Setup

As shown in Fig. 1, VLC communication system using White Light LED setup is realized
with the help of Optisystem 13.0.1. The Pseudo random data sequence is generated from
the BER test set with a reference bit rate. This data sequence is converted into I and Q sym-
bols using QAM sequence generator. The symbols are taken as different amplitude levels
in both in-phase (I) and quadrature phase (Q) using M-ary sequence generators. The I and
Q symbols of QAM are modulated individually with RF subcarriers in OFDM Modula-
tor. Here, the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) points should be at least double the numbers
of subcarrier utilized for the above. FFT points set sub-carrier positions centered at DC
or 0 Hz. Modulation from 0 to 2.5 GHz range of frequencies are taken for lower-rate sub-
carrier tones. The position array in OFDM modulator sets the starting point of the sub-
carrier from the range of carrier or the position array arranges the position of subcarriers
from the central frequency of the OFDM spectra. In order to maintain the bandwidth of
the OFDM spectra the position array should be half of the number of subcarriers. Then
the OFDM modulated signals are further filtered with low pass raised cosine roll-off filter
which will shape the OFDM output pulses and minimise the Inter Symbol Interference
(ISI). The generated OFDM signals are further up converted to the RF carrier of 7.5 GHz
using Quadrature modulator. The electrical signal at Quadrature modulator is rescaled or
dc biased to an optimum level in order to directly drive the White LED source. The White
LED establishes the connection with photo detector which is located at few meters away
from the transmitter in free space. The free space channel characteristics are measured
practically at room temperature environment in a room of size 5 × 5 × 3 m by using 2 × 2
­Tekhol® White LED and HTC LUX meter [13]. This White LED was having luminescence

RF Spectrum Analyzer_3
Oscilloscope Visualizer
Optical Spectrum Analyzer_1
Constellation Visualizer
LP Cosine Roll Off Filter I
Cutoff frequency = 0.62 * Bit rate Hz RF Spectrum Analyzer - Input Optical Spectrum Analyzer

QAM Sequence Generator Subsystem OFDM Modulator Electrical Rescale White LED Source
Quadrature Modulator FSO Channel
Bits per symbol = 2 Bits Number of subcarriers = 512 Frequency = 7.5 GHz Frequency = 550 nm Range = 0.001 km
Number of FFT points = 1024 Electron life time = 1e-012 s Attenuation = 8000 dB/km
Number of prefix points = 0 RC constant = 1e-012 s Geometrical loss = YES
Transmitter aperture diameter = 7 cm
Receiver aperture diameter = 1.5 cm
Beam divergence = 1108 mrad

LP Cosine Roll Off Filter Q

Cutoff frequency = 0.62 * Bit rate Hz
BER Test Set
Bit rate = Bit rate Bits/s
Iterations = 1
Output sequence length = 16384 RF Spectrum Analyzer_4 RF Spectrum Analyzer - Output
Sequence length per iteration = 16384 Bits
Iteration Number = 2 Constellation Visualizer - Output
Input Sequence Length = 0.016384e+006
BER = 0
log of BER = -1000 RF Spectrum Analyzer_2 RF Spectrum Analyzer Oscilloscope Visualizer - Output

QAM Sequence Decoder Subsystem OFDM Demodulator Quadrature Demodulator Electrical Amplifier Band Pass Rectangle Filter Photodetector PIN
Bits per symbol = 2 Bits Number of subcarriers = 512 Frequency = 7.5 GHz Gain = 4 dB Frequency = 7.5 GHz Responsivity type = Si
Number of FFT points = 1024 Cutoff frequency = 6 GHz Bandwidth = 0.62*Bit rate Hz
Number of prefix points = 0

RF Spectrum Analyzer_1

Fig. 1  Experimental setup for the OFDM modulated VLC system using white LED

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Table 1  LED and photo diode specifications

LED parameters Values

Centre frequency 550 nm

Electron carrier life time 0.1 ns
RC time constant 0.1 ns
Quantum efficiency 65%
Photodiode parameters Values

Responsivity type Silicon

Dark current 10 nA
Shot noise distribution Gaussian

Table 2  Free space optics FSO parameters Values

component specifications
Attenuation 8 dB/m
Beam divergence (FWHM) 63.5°
Transmitter aperture diameter 7 cm
Receiver aperture diameter 1.5 cm

of about 120–160 lm, optical output power of 600 mw/LED and view angle of 120°. For
the measurement of channel parameters, Line of sight (LOS) model is taken i.e., without
any diffusion from the side wall is considered. LED is placed and illuminated at the room’s
centre [13]. The measured parameters are utilized in Free Space Optics (FSO) component
in Optisystem in order to realise the channel characteristics on simulation for our Visible
light communication using White LED. The electrical drive signal and Quantum efficiency
are setup to generate 7 W optical power at LED output in order to match the practically
measured LED output with average luminescence of 358 lm. The typical parameter values
of White LED, Photo diode, and the measured FSO component parameters are tabulated in
Tables 1 and 2 respectively.
For free space channel, the above measured parameters are utilized in following math-
ematical equation [13–15]. The link equation is

dR2
PReceived = PTransmitted 10−𝛼R∕10 (1)
(dT + 𝜃R)2

where ­dR receiver aperture diameter (m), d­ T transmitter aperture diameter (m), θ beam
divergence (mrad), R range (km) and α atmospheric attenuation (dB/km).
The received signal power for parameter range depends on the propagation distance
between transmitter and receiver. The attenuation of the LED’s output power depends on
two main parameters: attenuation and geometrical loss. The first parameter describes the
attenuation of the light source power in the atmosphere. The second parameter, Geometri-
cal loss, occurs due to spreading of the transmitted beam between the transmitter and the
receiver.

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Table 3  OFDM modulator OFDM modulator parameters Values

specifications
Number of subcarriers 512
Position array 256
Number of FFT points 1024
Cyclic prefix Symbol extension
DAC interpolation Cubic

Table 4  Simulation parameter in Optisystem layout properties Values

optisystem
Bit rate From 1 to 25 Gbps
Sequence length 16,384
Samples per bit 128
Number of samples 2,097,152

The received signal power at photo detector is determined by the atmospheric and aper-
ture loss of the channel [13, 15]. And the detected electrical signal at Photo detector output
is given to the rectangular filter to filter out the up converted OFDM signal at 7.5 GHz in
RF spectrum. The filtered RF signal is then down converted in the Quadrature modulator
with the carrier of 7.5 GHz and the intermediate frequency (IF) output of OFDM with its
subcarrier signal is recovered between 0 and 2.5 GHz range. OFDM demodulator parame-
ters at receiver should exactly match with transmitter in order to recover the QAM symbols
at the output. The OFDM modulator parameter and Optisystem simulation parameters are
given in Tables 3 and 4 respectively. Finally the QAM sequence detector detects the binary
sequences and it is compared with transmitted sequence to find out the Bit error rate and
log of BER.

3 Result and Discussion

Our OFDM modulated VLC system in Fig.  1 is analysed for various bit rates and link
ranges using Optisystem simulation. In our simulation, QAM coding is used for symbol
generation due to its higher spectral efficiency, bandwidth and robustness to noise com-
pared to the other coding techniques such as BPSK, QPSK and M-ary PAK. Performance
of this VLC system with component parameters as mentioned in Tables 1, 2, 3 and 4 and
for the 4-QAM Coded with OFDM modulation (OFDM parameter: number of subcarri-
ers = 512, position array = 256, number of FFT points = 1024) are evaluated and tabulated
in Tables 5, 6 and 7. For various link ranges and bit rates, performance parameters such
as BER versus log of BER, Optical received signal power versus OSNR, and Electrical
received signal power versus SNR are tabulated in Tables 5, 6, and 7 respectively.
Table 5 proves that the link range is reduced and BER is increased when the data rate
is increased. The Proposed VLC system can support a data rate of 10 Gbps up to the link
range of 2 m with permissible BER. Beyond which the link distance is drastically reduced

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Table 5  OFDM modulated VLC system performance (BER and Log of BER) for various bit rates and link ranges
Bit rate (Gbps) Link range

OFDM parameter: number of subcarriers = 512, position array = 256, number of FFT points = 1024

1 m 1.5 m 2 m 2.5 m 3 m

BER log of BER BER log of BER BER log of BER BER log of BER BER log of BER

1 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 4.87E−02 − 1.312

2 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 4.27E−04 − 3.369 1.17E−01 − 0.093
5 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 8.17E−03 − 2.088 2.22E−01 − 0.654
10 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 3.20E−02 − 1.495 2.90E−01 − 0.537
20 0 − 1000 6.10E−05 − 4.214 1.03E−03 − 2.984 9.04E−02 − 1.044 3.44E−01 − 0.464
25 2.40E−04 − 3.61 4.27E−04 − 3.369 2.07E−03 − 2.683 1.16E−01 − 0.937 3.61E−01 − 0.443
S. Selvendran et al.
 Table 6  OFDM modulated VLC system performance [optical received signal power and optical signal to noise ratio (OSNR)] for various bit rates and link ranges
Bit rate (Gbps) Link range

OFDM parameter: number of subcarriers = 512, position array = 256, number of FFT points = 1024

1 m 1.5 m 2 m 2.5 m 3 m

Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB)
signal power signal power signal power signal power signal power
(dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm)
Certain Investigation on Visible Light Communication with…

1 − 19.045 80.954 − 26.309 73.690 − 38.712 67.287 − 38.649 61.350 − 44.221 55.778
2 − 21.964 78.035 − 29.366 70.633 − 35.272 64.272 − 41.576 58.423 − 47.212 52.787
5 − 26.016 73.983 − 33.188 66.811 − 39.827 60.172 − 45.693 54.306 − 51.027 48.972
10 − 28.897 71.102 − 36.705 63.294 − 42.649 57.350 − 48.343 51.656 − 54.358 45.641
20 − 31.885 68.114 − 39.179 60.820 − 45.462 54.537 − 51.014 48.985 − 57.607 42.392
25 − 33.130 66.869 − 41.664 58.335 − 47.005 52.994 − 52.477 47.934 − 58.281 41.718

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Table 7  OFDM modulated VLC system performance [electrical received signal power and electrical signal to noise ratio (ESNR)] for various bit rates and link ranges
Bit rate (Gbps) Link range

OFDM parameter: number of subcarriers = 512, position array = 256, number of FFT points = 1024

1 m 1.5 m 2 m 2.5 m 3 m

Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB)
signal power signal power signal power signal power signal power
(dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm)

1 − 59.043 62.277 − 73.162 49.586 − 86.339 37.886 − 98.173 26.163 − 109.329 15.040
2 − 59.121 59.524 − 73.328 45.932 − 86.455 34.828 − 98.201 23.153 − 109.780 11.625
5 − 59.249 55.499 − 73.969 43.025 − 86.474 30.715 − 98.239 19.068 − 109.805 7.531
10 − 59.658 53.114 − 74.859 39.865 − 86.720 28.420 − 98.802 16.945 − 110.071 5.206
20 − 62.475 50.301 − 76.568 38.073 − 90.317 24.851 − 100.749 14.313 − 111.846 3.447
25 − 62.902 49.755 − 77.362 37.368 − 91.219 24.007 − 101.183 14.138 − 114.362 2.820
S. Selvendran et al.
Certain Investigation on Visible Light Communication with…

to about 1  m and below. Tables  6 and 7 also conform with the above inference in the
Table 5. The optimal FEC (Forward Error correction) BER of 1e−3 [16–18] is obtained at
≈ 54 dB of OSNR and ≈ 19 dB of ESNR as per Tables 6 and 7 respectively. These OSNR
and ESNR values are also better than the minimum acceptable values of ≈ 50 dB of OSNR
and a range of 13.6–15 dB of ESNR as reported by the contemporary literatures [19–23].
Figure 2 shows every stage output of our OFDM modulated VLC system for the bit rate
of 10 Gbps and the link range of 1 m. Figure 2a indicates the transmitted bit sequence at
10  Gbps using BER test set and it is converted into QAM format using QAM generator
along with M-ary conversion and the resultant constellation of this sequence is shown in
Fig. 2b. This QAM modulated I and Q signals are modulated with 512 subcarriers (subcar-
riers frequency span is 0–2.5 GHz) to generate OFDM signals. Figure 2c, d show OFDM
outputs of I and Q channels respectively after the LP cosine filter. For further transmis-
sion of the signal, it is modulated with higher carrier frequency and its center frequency is
shifted to 7.5 GHz with either sides of subcarrier bands as depicted in Fig. 2e. As shown
in Fig. 2f, electrical pulses at Quadrature modulator output has negative portion of elec-
trical signals which would not allow exactly to reproduce the modulated signal using the
LED. Therefore, this electrical pulse is rescaled using DC bias as shown in Fig. 2g. This dc
biased electrical pulses are now used to modulate the White LED and the emission spec-
trum is as shown in Fig. 2h. The emission spectrum produces a Lambertian pattern and it
is affected by atmospheric losses before it reaches the Line of sight (LOS) photo diode.
This transmitted signal is detected with the help of Photodetector and its output spectrum
is noticed as in Fig. 2i in the RF spectrum analyzer. It clearly depicts that the photodiode
exactly reproduces the OFDM modulated output with center frequency of 7.5 GHz. This
OFDM spectrum is filtered out using Bandpass rectangular filter as depicted in Fig.  2j.
This OFDM spectrum is down converted by coherent demodulation with local oscilla-
tor frequency of 7.5 GHz and our OFDM subcarriers (I and Q) are extracted as shown in
Fig. 2k, l respectively. Finally, OFDM demodulator demodulates the subcarriers and gener-
ates the original QAM bit sequence, and it is verified with constellation diagram as shown
in Fig. 2m. Thereafter, the original bit sequence is decoded with the help of QAM decoder
as shown in Fig. 2n and it is fed back to BER test set to compare the received bit sequence
with that of the transmitted bit sequence and hence the BER is calculated. From these fig-
ures, it is clearly understood that the received sequences exactly match with the transmit-
ted sequences and there is no BER and hence the constellation also very good at receiver
point. As shown in Fig. 3, when the link range is raised to 2.5 m with 10 Gbps bitrate, the
received constellation is disturbed so much since the signal is more affected by free space
attenuation and signal phase error compared to the link range of 1 m as in Fig. 2m. Without
BER, the maximum link range obtained for the data rate of 1 Gbps was 2.56 m as shown in
Tables 5, 6, 7 and Fig. 4.
It is possible to extend the link range up to 2.5 m even at 5 Gbps bit rate, in case of
receiver with proper equalization arrangement. The large sequence length of 16,384 bits
enable us to measure more realistic BER in our OFDM modulated VLC system analysis
and it shows drastic variation in log of BER even for 2 or 3-bit error. The orthogonal
nature of subcarrier frequency used in our system along with cosine filter reduce the
frequency depended fading and inter symbol interference (ISI) and support higher bit
rate of 10 Gbps. Beyond the data rate of 10 Gbps, the signal degradation can be reduced
only if the OFDM subcarrier is increased [12]. As shown in Table 8 and Fig. 5, the BER
is good, even for 25 Gbps due to the increase in OFDM modulation subcarrier from 512
to 1024 and the respective increase in orthogonal bit sequences. But the link distance
is limited to 1.5  ms only. In order to ensure the quality improvement of transmission

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Fig. 2  Our OFDM modulated VLC system outputs at every stage for the bit rate of 10 Gbps and the link
range of 1 m. a Transmitted bit sequence, b transmitted QAM constellation, c OFDM output − I channel
after the LP cosine filter, d OFDM output − Q channel after the LP cosine filter, e quadrature modulator
output at transmitter (7.5 GHz up converted signals), f electrical pulses at quadrature modulator output, g
electrical rescale output (DC biasing), h white LED emissive spectrum, i photo detector output RF spec-
trum, j filtered RF spectrum of OFDM signal, k quadrature demodulator output (down converted) I chan-
nel, l quadrature demodulator output (down converted) Q channel, m after OFDM demodulation-received
QAM constellation diagram, n received bit sequences

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Fig. 2  (continued)

Fig. 3  Received signal constel-

lation diagram for the bit rate of
10 Gbps and link range of 2.5 m

Fig. 4  Bit error rate of the received signal for various bit rates and link ranges

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Table 8  OFDM modulated VLC system performance (BER and log of BER) for higher bit rates and link ranges at large number of subcarriers
Bit rate (Gbps) Link range

OFDM parameter: number of subcarriers = 1024, position array = 512, number of FFT points = 2048

1 m 1.5 m 2 m 2.5 m 3 m

BER log of BER BER log of BER BER log of BER BER log of BER BER log of BER

20 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 5.49E−04 − 3.26 7.61E−02 − 1.119 3.30E−01 − 0.482

25 0 − 1000 0 − 1000 4.88E−04 − 3.311 9.73E−02 − 1.012 3.52E−01 − 0.455
S. Selvendran et al.
Certain Investigation on Visible Light Communication with…

Fig. 5  Bit error rate of the received signal for large number of subcarriers and for different link ranges at
higher bit rates

by increasing the number of subcarriers, in addition to the Table 8, the received signal
power versus SNR also measured and given in Table 9 and Table 10. They clearly indi-
cate the significant improvement in the observed SNR when the subcarriers increase
from 512 to 1024. For the number of OFDM subcarrier variation, the received QAM
signal constellation diagram is observed. Constellation diagrams for 20 Gbps bit rate
and link range of 1.5 m are shown in Figs. 6 and 7 respectively for 512 and 1024 subcar-
riers. They clearly depict if OFDM subcarrier is increased from 512 to 1024, then the
signal gets less distorted and constellation phase error is reduced notably. Moreover, the
signal BER is also improved.

4 Conclusion

We have simulated a White LED visible light communication with OFDM modulation for
a practically measured free space channel parameters. For the analysis of different bit rates
and link ranges using Optisystem tool, our designed system can support up to 2 m of link
range with a bit rate of 10 Gbps. The link range can be extended up to 2.5 m for a lower bit
rate of 1 Gbps. In addition, we have discussed the influence of OFDM subcarrier numbers
on the system performance. The signal distortion at higher bit rate is overcome signifi-
cantly by increasing the number of OFDM subcarriers. By increasing the OFDM subcar-
riers, signal can be detected with improved BER up to 25 Gbps data rate. But the distance
is limited to 1.5 m only. The designed system can open up the option for higher bit rate
communication in future VLC system. However, this work has a limitation of Line of Sight
communication from White LED. But, multiple reflections from the walls and corners are
also received by the receiver in practical scenario which would drastically vary the power
and phase of the received signal in this Non-Line of sight (NLOS) case. Hence there is lot
of scope for furthering this research for NLOS along with MIMO cases in future to ascer-
tain the reality of the signal transmission in VLC.

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Table 9  OFDM modulated VLC system performance [optical received signal power and optical signal to noise ratio (OSNR)] for higher bit rates and link ranges at large num-
ber of subcarriers
Bit rate (Gbps) Link range

OFDM parameter: number of subcarriers = 1024, position array = 512, number of FFT points = 2048

1 m 1.5 m 2 m 2.5 m 3 m

Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB) Received OSNR (dB)
signal power signal power signal power signal power signal power
(dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm)

20 − 31.346 68.653 − 38.843 61.156 − 45.492 54.507 − 51.038 48.961 − 57.307 42.693
25 − 32.626 67.373 − 39.809 60.191 − 46.672 53.327 − 51.137 48.862 − 58.222 41.778
S. Selvendran et al.
 Table 10  OFDM modulated VLC system performance [electrical received signal power and electrical signal to noise ratio (ESNR)] for higher bit rates and link ranges at large
number of subcarriers
Bit rate (Gbps) Link range

OFDM parameter: number of subcarriers = 1024, position array = 512, number of FFT points = 2048

1 m 1.5 m 2 m 2.5 m 3 m

Certain Investigation on Visible Light Communication with…

Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB) Received ESNR (dB)
signal power signal power signal power signal power signal power
(dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm) (dBm)

20 − 61.788 50.918 − 76.036 38.591 − 88.785 26.326 − 100.409 14.841 − 111.754 3.537
25 − 62.328 50.238 − 77.241 37.476 − 90.289 24.927 − 101.027 14.346 − 113.918 2.839

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Fig. 6  Received signal constel-

lation diagram for 512 OFDM
subcarrier and bit rate of 20 Gbps
at the link range of 1.5 m

Fig. 7  Received signal constel-

lation diagram for 1024 OFDM
subcarrier and bit rate of 20 Gbps
at the link range of 1.5 m

Acknowledgements The authors acknowledge the Department of Science and Technology (DST), New
Delhi for their Grant to purchase Optiwave simulation software under the fund for the improvement of S&T
infrastructure (FIST) scheme.

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Publisher’s Note  Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and
institutional affiliations.

S. Selvendran  has finished his B.E. in Electronics and Communication

Engineering, M.E. in Optical Communication Engineering and Ph.D.
in Nonlinear fiber Optics. Currently he is working as an Associate Pro-
fessor in CVR college of Engineering, R.R district, Telangana (An
Autonomous Engineering College). He has published 33 papers in the
reputed international journals and 11 papers in international and
national conferences. His research interests include Optical Communi-
cation, Nonlinear Fiber Optics, Visible Light Communication, Pho-
tonic Crystal Devices, Optical Fiber design, Plasmonics, and
Biosensor.

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 S. Selvendran et al.

A. Sivanantha Raja  has completed his B.E. in Electronics and Com-

munication Engineering, M.E. in Microwave and Optical Engineering
and Ph.D. in Biomedical Applications. Currently he is working as an
Associate Professor in A.C. College of Engineering and Technology,
Karaikudi (An Autonomous Government Engineering College). Under
his guidance 9 Ph.D. scholars and 2  M.S. scholars have completed
their dissertation and currently he is guiding 5 Ph.D. Scholars. Also,
he has guided more than 90 M.E. thesis in the fields of optical commu-
nication networks, photonic crystal-based component devices and bio-
medical applications. He has published around 114 papers in the
reputed international and national journals, more than 75 papers in the
international and national conferences and contributed 3 book
chapters.

K. Esakki Muthu  is an Assistant Professor at the University VOC. Col-

lege of Engineering. He received his B.E. degree from Madurai
Kamaraj University in 2001 and M.E. degree in Optical Communica-
tion from the Anna University in 2005. He has pursued his Ph.D.
degree in the field of MM-Wave Radio over Fibre systems in Anna
University, Chennai. He has published more than 25 research articles
in the reputed Journals and Conferences. His current research interests
include MM-Wave Radio over Fiber, Photonic Crystal Devices, and
Wireless Communication.

A. Lakshmi  was born at Rajapalayam, India in 1978. She graduated her

Diploma in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Gov-
ernment Polytechnic, Madurai in 1999, under graduation in ECE in
Madurai Kamaraj University in 2002 and post-graduation in Optical
Communication in 2007 from Anna University, Chennai, India. She
has completed her Ph.D. (Medical Image Processing) in the year 2018
from Kalasalingam Academy of Research and Education (KARE),
Krishnan Koil, Tamil nadu (Deemed to be University) Krishnankoil.
Now she is working as an Associate Professor in the Department of
Electronics and Communication Engineering, Kalasalingam Academy
of Research and Education (KARE). She has published 7 International
Journals, 8 papers in International level conferences and 15 National
level Conferences. Her research interests include Soft Computing,
Image processing, Digital Signal Processing and Optical
communication.

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