Underwater Visible Light Communication Systems: A Concise Review

UVLC have gained a considerable interest during the last few years as an alternative means for broadband
inexpensive submarine communications. The technology that is mostly used nowadays among divers, ships, etc.
is mainly based on acoustic wave transmission. However, it is restricted to several hundreds of kbps at ranges of
a few kilometers, supports slow data rates, and distresses marine mammals such as dolphins and whales. On the
other hand, traditional electromagnetic (EM) waves are highly attenuated in water due to both absorption and
scattering. Therefore, they can be used only for relatively short-range real-time applications in the order of a few
centimeters to a few meters.

EM waves in the visible spectrum, for example, optical signals between 400 and 700nm, propagate faster in
water than acoustic ones. However, the optical transmitters and receivers must be located at a short distance,
since turbulence and multiscattering effects significantly deteriorate the performance. Chromatic dispersion also
causes temporal broadening of the optical pulses. In contrast to the above impairments, seawater shows a
decreased absorption in the blue/green region of the visible spectrum. Hence, using suitable wavelengths, high
data rates can be attained. It was also demonstrated that UOWC networks are feasible to operate at high data
rates for medium distances up to a hundred meters.

UOWC present numerous similarities compared to free space optical (FSO) communications or laser satellite
links mainly due to the fact that they employ optical wavelengths to transfer secure information between
dedicated point-to-point links. It constitutes an alternate and effective transmission technique for underwater
communications, instead of the traditional acoustic one.

Reason of using Optical waves:

Optical wireless communications are a relatively new technology providing many serious advantages, such as
the very high rates of data transmission, secure links, very small and light size of the transceiver components,
including apertures, low installation and operational cost, and no need of licensing fees and tariffs, since the
optical band is not included in the telecommunications regulations. Optical wireless uses modulated optical
beams in order to establish short, medium or long communications. Unfortunately, because the propagation
medium is the free space, the performance and the reliability of these systems depend mainly on the weather
conditions between the receiver and the transmitter. EM waves in the visible spectrum (400–700nm) present an
alternative way to provide broadband communications in the water. They propagate faster in water
(300,000,000m/s) than the acoustic ones (∼340m/s in air–∼1500m/s in water), which is about 200,000 times
faster than sound travels through water. That is the main reason why they have gained a considerable interest
during the last years to serve as a broadband (10–100Mbps), safe (non-interceptable), and reliable complement
to legacy acoustic underwater communications systems

Reason of Using Blue-green Region:

In general, optical signals are highly absorbed in water, and this is one of the main disadvantages; the other one
is the optical scattering by all the particles existing inside the sea. However, seawater shows a decreased
absorption in the blue/green region of the visible spectrum. Thus, using suitable wavelengths, for instance in the
blue/green region, high speed connections can be attained according to the type of water (400–500nm for clear
to 300–700nm for turbid water conditions). Minimum attenuation is centered near 0.460μm in clear waters and
shifts to higher values for dirty waters approaching 0.540μm for coastal waters.

Roughly speaking, the power received P(z), given initial power P0, propagating through a medium of thickness
z is estimated by the Beer’s Law as follows

c(λ)(m^-1 ) is the extinction coefficient expressing the total attenuation occurred by the propagation through the
water. According to the Haltrin’s model, the total attenuation can be described as the sum of absorption and
scattering. For a completely absorbing or completely scattering medium, the total attenuation coefficient in Eq.
(4) can be replaced with the absorption coefficient, that is, a, or scattering coefficient, that is, b, respectively.
The product cz is also referred as attenuation length, and it contributes on the reduction of the received power by
a factor of exp(-1), or ~63%. Based on the above, we have

where a(λ) is the absorption coefficient, b(λ) is the scattering coefficient, and λ is the wavelength. Beer’s Law
provides a limited applicability as it describes only the attenuation due to absorption and single scattering
events. In reality, however, many cases of multiple scattering may occur. Also it presumes that the source and
receiver are in exact alignment with each other, and it can be applied only in Line-of-Sight (LOS)
communication scenarios. Moreover, Beer’s Law ignores temporal dispersion.

UOWC propagation phenomena

3.1. Aquatic medium characteristics
The aquatic medium contains almost 80 different elements, dissolved or suspended in pure water, with different
concentrations. Some of them are listed below

 Various dissolved salts such as NaCl, MgCl2, etc, which absorb light at specific wavelengths and
induce scattering effects.
 Detrital and mineral components, for example, sand, metal oxides, which contribute to both absorption
and scattering.
 Colored dissolved organic matters such as fulvic and humic acids which affect absorption, mainly in
blue and ultraviolet wavelengths.
 Organic matters such as viruses, bacteria, and organic detritus which add backscattering, especially in
the blue spectral range.
 Phytoplankton with chlorophyll-A which strongly absorbs in the blue-red region and scatters green
light.

Since chlorophyll absorbs the blue and red wavelengths and the particles strongly contribute to the
scattering coefficient, we can use its concentration C (in mg/m3 ) as the free parameter to calculate the
absorption and scattering coefficients. The exact type of water plays a significant role in the estimation of
the amount of chlorophyll concentration and consequently the amount of absorption and scattering for a
specific geographic location. A classification system for the clarity of water types based on their spectral
optical attenuation depth was proposed by Jerlov in 1968. This classification was made in the upper
portions of the ocean, and it was based on spectral irradiance transmittance measurements. The four major
water types that are usually referred in the literature are the following

• Pure deep ocean waters cobalt blue where the absorption is high and the scattering coefficient is low.

• Clear sea waters with higher scattering due to many dissolved particles.

• Near coasts ocean waters with absorption and scattering due to planktonic matters, detritus, and mineral
components.

• Harbor murky waters, which are quite constraining for optical propagation due to dissolved and in-suspension
matters.

3.2. Absorption
The absorption coefficient, α(λ), is the ratio of the absorbed energy from an incident power per unit distance due
to various dissolved particles such as phytoplankton, detritus, etc. [19, 23]

where α(λ) is the absorption by the pure water in m^-1 , λ is the wavelength in nm, is the absorption
coefficient of chlorophyllin m^-1 , C c is the total concentration of chlorophyll per cubic meter (C c =
0
 0
1mg/m^3 ), α f 35.959 m^2 /mg is the absorption coefficient of fulvic acid, K f = 0.0189 nm^-1 , = 18.828

m^2 /mg is the absorption coefficient of humic acid, and = 0.01105 nm1 . The concentrations C f and C c,
are expressed through C c as follows

3.3. Scattering
Scattering coefficient, b(λ), is the ratio of energy scattered from an incident power per unit distance. It is the
sum of backward scattering, , and forward scattering coefficient, . Scattering is caused by small and
large particles. Small particles are the particles with refractive index equal to 1.15, whereas large particles have
a refractive index of 1.03. The scattering and backscattering coefficients are calculated as follows [23]

For small and large particulate matter, and are given as follows

and the concentrations are expressed through the chlorophyll concentration as follows

Extinction Coefficient Values of different Oceanic water types used in Simulation are given in the below table:

3.4 Oceanic turbulence

Optical wireless communications are greatly affected by optical turbulence, which refers to random fluctuations
of the refraction index. In the case of underwater systems, these fluctuations are mainly caused by variations in
temperature and salinity of the oceanic water. An important parameter for the description of oceanic turbulence
is the scintillation index, which expresses the variance of the wave intensity. when a Gaussian beam propagates
through weak turbulence and without taking into consideration the scattering phenomenon, the scintillation
index is expressed as the sum of two components
Where

is the longitudinal component and

is the radial component. In the above equations, λ is the wavelength, k is the wave number, L is the direction of
propagation, k is the magnitude of spatial frequency, ξ is the normalized path length, is the zero order
Bessel function, and Λ, Θ are parameters of the Gaussian beam given by

and

where is the radius of the Gaussian beam at the 1/e amplitude at the plane of propagation and is the
radius of curvature of the beam wavefront. The function is the power spectrum of turbulence and for
homogeneous and isotropic oceanic waters takes the form

where η = 10−3 m is the Kolmogorov microscale, ε is the rate of dissipation of turbulent kinetic energy per unit
mass of fluid, is the rate of dissipation of mean-square temperatur , and
are constants with values . The
unitless variable w is the relative strength of the fluctuations caused by either temperature or salinity.

The separation between weak and strong turbulence is usually done via Rytov variance , which is the
scintillation index when a plane wave is considered. More specifically, values of correspond to weak
fluctuations, whereas indicates a strong turbulence regime. In contrast to atmospheric studies, strong
oceanic turbulence appears at distances shorter than 100m.

The fading coefficient can be computed statistically using a proper distribution depending on the turbulence
regime. The log-normal distribution is used in situations of weak fluctuations, and its probability density
function (PDF) can be written as follows :
The fading coefficient in the above Eq. takes the form , where X is the fading logamplitude with mean
and variance . Normalizing the fading coefficient so as to ensure that fading does not affect the average
power leads to

For strong turbulence, the distribution that is usually used is the gamma gamma distribution with PDF

ak +bk
2 ak +b k
f α (α k )= 2(ak b k )
k α 2
−1
K a −b (
Г ( ak ) Г ( bk ) k k k

2 √ a k bk α k

The main drawback of underwater visible light communication is less communication link range. So here some
of the simulation has been done by me to enhance the performance of UVLC system.

1. Using Mach-Zehnder Modulator :

To investigate the effect of different water types as a function of communication link range and for different
wavelengths, simulation has been done. Simulation set-up consists of transmitter, receiver, visualizers,
modulators and power meter, as shown in Figure 2, and simulation parameters are shown in Table 4. In the
transmitter side, continuous-wave Laser diode at different wavelengths (basically 450nm, 550nm and
650nm) is used having the power of 125mW. The optical signal is transmitted through different water types
like the clean ocean, crystal ocean and turbid harbour. Amplitude Modulator and Mach-Zehnder Modulator
are used for the modulation purpose, and the performance of these modulators are also investigated. Log-
Normal (LN) distribution is used as the Scintillation model of the channel, along with extinction coefficient.
At the receiver side, PIN photodiode is used to receive the optical signal. Gaussian low pass filter is used
with the cut-off frequency of 0.75*Bit rate, and the power meter is used for the reading of received power.
In this simulation, different types of water like the clean ocean, coastal ocean and turbid harbour are used as
a channel.

Figure 2. Schematic layout of a proposed underwater optical wireless communication system in Optisystem
By using the parameters given in table 4. BER, Q-factor, received power, and noise power at the receiver end in
the line-of-sight is calculated using Optisystem. To simulate the communication link in Optisystem, optical
transmitter, free-space optics (FSO) with proper attenuation losses and optical receivers were utilized.
Table 4 Parameters used in the simulation

Parameter Value
Extinction coefficient for:

Clean ocean 0.15

Coastal ocean 0.3
Turbid harbour 2.19
Operational wavelength:
Blue 450nm
Green 550nm
Red 650nm
Optical efficiency for:
Transmitter 0.9
Receiver 0.9
Transmitter power 125mW
ϴ 30degrees
Beam divergence angle (θ0 ) 60degrees

Receiver width 100μm

Link Range 10m-1000m
Optical transmitter
Power 125mW
Wavelength 450nm, 550nm,650nm
Modulation NRZ
Optical receiver
Photodetector With shot noise and thermal
noise
Responsivity 1A/W
Dark current 10nA

Bit rate 1GHz

Amplitude of NR pulse 1 a.u.

Modulation index 1

Cut-off frequency of filter 0.75*Bit rate

Results:

Figure 9. logBER Vs link range for AM and MZ Figure 11. Plot logBER Vs SNR for MZ modulator for
modulators different water types.

From figure 9, we concluded that MZ modulator is superior to AM modulator.

Figure 11 is graph between logBER Vs SNR for MZ modulator for different water types, which shows that SNR
and BER are inversely proportional to each other. As the value of SNR increases, BER decreases [1].

2. Performance comparisons between Avalanche and PIN photodetectors for use in

underwater optical wireless communication systems

Recently, lots of investigation has been taken place for basic PIN photodiode and more expensive,
voltage hungry, and complicated Avalanche photodetector performances. Because of the high demand
for these ultra-fast receivers in the commercial section, lots of research has been taken place to cut
down the price of the photodiodes. Avalanche photodiode is the best option for long-range
communication because of its internal gain [13-20, 25]. As lots of research takes place in the
development of PIN and Avalanche photodiodes, both provide the bandwidth of up to 1THz or higher,
which gives lots of opportunity to new design concerns. Because of the high-performance avalanche
photodetector, considerable improvement of an influence-ionization factor for the electron movement
takes place. Because of this avalanche effect, it affects internal current gain, as multiple collision takes
place, which causes primary electrons to generate additional free electrons in the silicon lattice. In
avalanche photodetector, the typical gain is approximately 100.
The main aim of the optical wireless link is to transmit information signals over secured long distances.
As in underwater wireless communication, the main issue is its short distance coverage. So to enhance
the communication link distance in this paper, we are using different types of photodetectors such as
Avalanche photodetector and PIN photodetector, to observe their performances on the communication
link distances.

Results

Figure 2. logBER Vs distance graph for Avalanche Figure 3. logBER Vs SNR plot for different oceanic water
photodetector versus PIN photodetector for different types having PIN and avalanche photodetector on the
modulation schemes. receiver side with different modulation schemes i.e.
amplitude modulation and Mach-Zehnder modulation.

From the above figure 2, it has been concluded that, as the distance increases bit error rate also
increases. But for avalanche photodetector, the bit error rate is comparatively less for the increase in
distance as compared to the PIN photodetector in both modulation schemes. And from figure 3, it has
been concluded that, as the SNR decreases bit error rate also increases. But for avalanche
photodetector, the bit error rate is comparatively less for the decrease in SNR as compared to the PIN
photodetector in both modulation schemes.

Hence, concluded from the simulation that the avalanche photodetector covers more distance as compared to the
PIN photodetector and also provides minimum bit-error-rate for less value of SNR in avalanche photodetector as
compared to the PIN photodetector [2].
 3. Investigation of photodetector responsivity on the performance of underwater
optical wireless communication systems
In UOWC system, optical-to-electrical signal conversion efficiency of a photodiode is measured by photodiode
responsivity, which is defined by the value of photocurrent (mA) produced by each milliwatt of optical
information signal. Ideally, photodiode responsivity ℜ should be constant but practically, ℜ is a function of both
information signal wavelength and optical power of information signal.

Photodiode responsivity is linearly changed by varying the attenuation of variable attenuator linearly because of
which optical power P that is going to be entered into the photodiode also varies linearly. Responsivity of
photodiode is defined as the ratio of the generated photocurrent (I) to the amount of optical power ( P0) incident
on the photodiode, which is measured in Amperes/Watt

I (4)
ℜ=
P0
A photodetector is incapable of collecting all the photons and convert them into electron-hole pairs. The number
of electrons produced per incident photon is known as Quantum efficiency, which is usually expressed as,

η= (5)
No . of electrons produced
( x 100 %)
No . of incident photons
If I is the photon-current in the circuit and P0 is the incident optical power, then Quantum efficiency is defined
as;

I /q (6)
η =
P 0 /hν
From above equation (6), we get modified expression for responsivity,

I qη qη (7)
ℜ= = = λ
P 0 hν hc
So, from the above equation (7), we can say that responsivity depends on wavelength λ and Quantum efficiency
η. For practical photodetector, responsivity is weakly dependent on wavelength which can be ignored while its
dependence on quantum efficiency cannot be ignored.

In this paper, two types of photodetectors are used i.e., PIN photodiode and Avalanche photodiode. In PIN
photodiode internal gain is zero while Avalanche photodiode has internal gain which is equivalent to the
multiplication factor M. Hence responsivity of PIN photodiode is given by

I ph qη (8)
ℜ= = λ
P0 hc
while responsivity of Avalanche photodiode is increased by the multiplication factor M hence given as

I ph qλ (9)
ℜ= = Mη
P0 hc
Hence, the responsivity of photodetectors affects the performance of underwater optical wireless communication
systems.

Results
 Figure 2(a). log(BER) Vs distance graph for PIN Figure 2(b). log(BER) Vs distance graph for APD
photodetector for different responsivity value for amplitude photodetector for different responsivity value for amplitude
modulation scheme modulation scheme.

Figure 2(c). log(BER) Vs distance graph for PIN Figure 2(d). log(BER) Vs distance graph for APD
photodetector for different responsivity value for Mach- photodetector for different responsivity value for Mach-
Zehnder modulation scheme. Zehnder modulation scheme

In Figure 2 (a) – (d), we have presented log(BER) versus link range (d) graph for variable responsivity values of
both photodiodes i.e., PIN and Avalanche photodiode which depicts that as the responsivity increases,
communication link distance increases for the targeted BER of 10−9. Hence, we can conclude that higher the
responsivity of the photodetector, higher will be the link coverage distance and lesser SNR will be needed,
which will be beneficial for long-distance underwater optical wireless communication system. By using proper
converging lens at the receiver side, we can get higher responsivity value which help underwater optical
wireless communication system to cover longer distance.

4. Effect of Variable LED Rise Time on High Speed OOK Underwater Visible
Light Communication System

In this section we have evaluated the effect of variable LED rise time on Underwater VLC system. The LED is a
device controlled by current, its brightness is proportional to the current through it, The amount of current that
passes through the LED, can be controlled in two ways. The first method is to limit the current analogously, the
second way is to vary the pulse width. A LED can be modeled as an RC circuit (like a low pass filter of the first
order ), the digital modulation of a LED involves two distinct states (ON and OFF). In ON/OFF applications the
rise and fall times are limited by the LED intrinsic capacitance [8]. In order to achieve higher accuracy and
improve system performance, it is necessary to take into account the values of the rise time (tr) and the fall time
(tf ) (Fig. 2) in the LED.
According to these two values, the minimum time of the Duty Cycle in the signal (to reach the work point in the
LED) must be:

For 1st order Low-pass RC network, unit step response of the system is given by:
−t (8)
V(t) = V (1−e τ )
0
where τ is an RC time constant. Time taken by the signal to achieve x% of the voltage level is given by solving
equation (8):
x (9)
t x % = -τln(1- )
100
Thus, rise time t r can be written as:
t r = t 0.9 - t 0.1 = τln9 (10)
Hence the 3dB-bandwidth of low pass RC system is given below:
1 (11)
f 3 dB =
2 πτ
From equation (10) and (11), 3dB bandwidth of the system can be approximated by the rise time of the received
signal as:
ln 9 0.35 (12)
f 3 dB = ≅
2 π tr tr
Hence from equation (7) and (12), channel capacity equation can be written as:
0.35 E {P s } (13)
C≅ * log 2 (1+ )
tr E {Pn }
From equation (13), approximated capacity of channel for each transmitter and receiver LED set can be
calculated by the rise time, average noise power and average signal power of the received signal.

In this section, the desired lighting level varies between 10% and 90% of the maximum light output in the LED.
Under this conditions, the maximum speed of data transmission or bit rate (V ) can be calculated as follows:

In this section, performance evaluation is done for variable rise time of LEDs with respect to communication
link distance (d), SNR and BER. From equation (13) it is clear that, channel capacity depends on the rise time of
LED.
Here, different values of LED rise times are considered, which is presented in Table 3.

Table 3. Simulated values of rise time of LED

Rise time of LED 0.25μs 0.5μs 0.75μs
 Results:

Fig. 2(a): log(BER) Vs distance graph for PIN photodetector for Fig. 3(a): log(BER) Vs distance graph for Avalanche
variable rise time of LED photodiode for variable rise time of LED for OOK
scheme.

In this paper, we have investigated the impact of variable rise time of LED on the performance of
underwater visible light communication system for different types of photodetectors i.e., Avalanche and
PIN photodiode, which shows that as the rise time of LED decreases, performance of UVLC system
increases.

5. Impact of Variable Aperture Area of Receiver on High-Speed OOK Underwater

Visible Light Communication System

To reduce the degradation of the propagating signal due to atmospheric turbulence (AT) effects, a number of
options have been proposed, including (i) spatial diversity with adequate spacing (ii) beam width optimization,
where the radiation pattern of the beam is altered, (iii) complex modulation and coding; and (iv) Aperture
Averaging (AA)technique, which is a simple method and can be easily achieved in a VLC system on the Rx
side. AA involves using a lens in front of a small optical detector, thereby increasing the collection area of the
Rx, hence lowering the effects of AT and spatially filtering the high fluctuations of the received optical beam.
The AA factor is expressed as . We present here simulation results for the degree of light collimation (i.e.,
the beam divergence angle θ1/2) of a light source with AA and under weak to moderate turbulence conditions.
We present here simulation results for the degree of light collimation (i.e., the beam divergence angle θ1/2) of a
light source with AA and under weak to moderate turbulence conditions
In this paper, different values of receiver aperture diameter are considered which is shown in Table 3.

Table 3. Simulated Receiver aperture diameter

Receiver Aperture 0.75 1 1.25 1.5
Diameter cm cm cm cm

Results

Fig. 2(a): log(BER) Vs distance graph for PIN Fig. 3(b) log(BER) Vs distance graph for
photodetector for variable receiver aperture area for Avalanche photodetector for variable receiver
amplitude modulation scheme aperture area for amplitude modulation scheme.
 From the above simulation results we can say that, on increasing the receiver aperture diameter less SNR is
required to attain the BER of 10−9 and communication link distance also increases. Hence, we can
conclude that more aperture area covers longer distance with less SNR, which will be beneficial for long-
distance UVLC system.

6. Performance Evaluation of Underwater Visible Light Communication System

for Strong Oceanic Turbulence Channel

In this section, the performance of vertical UVLC link is investigated in the presence of strong oceanic
turbulence conditions using probability density function of Gamma-Gamma model. Main technical issue with
moving UVLC system is directing, tracking and acquisition. In addition, refractive index also changes vertically
as oceanic depth affects variance of turbulence-induced fading. On considering these variations depending on
depths of ocean, we develop statistically strong oceanic turbulence channel model based on the fading
coefficient of gamma-gamma model. The effect of using Gamma-Gamma model for strong oceanic turbulence
condition is investigated on the bit-error rate, signal-to-noise ratio, communication link distance.
In UVLC, channel modeling is done by using Beer-Lambert’s law to model the impact of absorption and
scattering phenomenon which is given below [20]
Ar (m+ 1) (2)
Hl = −cd
2 π d2 m
e cos (Փ)
cos(Ψ)T(Ψ)g(Ψ)

where Ψ is the angle of incidence, Փ is the angle of irradiance with respect to the perpendicular axis of the
transmitter, g(Ψ) is the optical gain of the concentrator and T(Ψ) is the optical gain of the filter. In this paper,
g(Ψ) is supposed to be unity, but T(Ψ) varies depending on the type of photodetector i.e., Avalanche or PIN
photodiode. For PIN photodiode value of T(Ψ) is unity but for avalanche photodiode, its value lies in the range
of 100-1000, and m is the Lambert’s mode number which shows directivity of light source beam, d is the
distance between transmitter and the receiver (in meters), Ar is the area of photodetector, and c is the extinction
coefficient.

Fading Statistics of UVLC Channel

In the above section, we have described the modeling of absorption and scattering effects. In addition, with
absorption and scattering, strong oceanic turbulence is also taken into account by considering a vertical
underwater communication link having a distance of d T . Assuming that source is positioned at the depth of d 0
from the surface of the ocean. Vertical underwater link is modeled as successive layers. Fading coefficient
associated with different layers are modeled as identical non independent Gamma-Gamma distribution random
variables. Assume d k and α k denotes thickness and multiplicative fading coefficient for the k th layer, where k =
K
1,2,3…., K. hence total communication link distance d T = ∑ d k. Total fading coefficient covering K layers is
k =1
shown by
K (3)
αT = ∏ αk
k =1
where probability density function of α k follows gamma-gamma distribution and is shown below [21]
ak +bk (4)
2 ak +b k
f α (α k )= 2(ak b k )
k αk 2
−1
K a −b (
Г ( a k ) Г ( bk ) k k

2 √ ak bk α k
In equation (4), Г ( .) is a function of gamma and K v (.) is the second kind modified Bessel function with order
v . a k is the effective number of large-scale cells and b k is the effective number of small-scale cells of the
scattering process for the k th layer. On assuming plane wave propagation, a k and b k are given by [21,22]
0.491 σ 2α −1 (5)
a k =[exp( )−1] k

(1+1.11 σ 12/
α )
5 7/6
k
2
0.52 σ α
−1 (6)
b k = [exp( 12/5 5/ 6
)−1] k

(1+0.69 σ α ) k
2
where σ α shows scintillation index for plane wave known as Rytov variance and is determined as [21]
k
1 ∞
dk k2 (7)
σ α =8 π 2 k 20 d k ∫ ∫ k Փ nk (k){1-cos[
2
k
0 0 k0
ζ]}dkdζ
where k 0 is wavenumber given by 2 π / λ and Փ nk (k) shows spatial power spectrum model of turbulent
fluctuations of ocean-water refractive index for the k th layer.

Results:

Fig. 2: log(BER) Vs distance graph for different photodetector for Fig. 3: log(BER) Vs SNR graph for different photodetector for
different modulation scheme different modulation scheme.

From figure (2) and (3), it has been concluded that in both Amplitude and MZ modulation scheme, Avalanche
photodetector performs better for strong oceanic turbulence UVLC system. It has been concluded from the
simulations and reading that for Avalanche photodetector, communication link distance is more, and less SNR is
required on comparing it with the performance of PIN photodetector.
Hence from the above readings we can say that the performance of Avalanche photodiode is better as compared
to the PIN photodiode for strong oceanic turbulence Underwater VLC system.

7. Effect of transmitter divergence-angle on the performance of UVLC System

Underwater visible light communication emerges as a promising technique to enhance the capacity of
underwater wireless communication networks for upcoming generation. Major technical problem with
underwater visible light communication systems in motion is the pointing, acquisition, and tracking. To ease
pointing, acquisition, and tracking, hence it is important to navigate optical information beam over broad range
and adjust the transmitter beam divergence angle according to the link condition, which is adjusted by the
Optisystem software. In this paper, performance comparison among wide range of transmittance optical beams
in underwater visible light communications system for high-speed communication is presented for PIN as well
as for Avalanche photodiode. The effect of using variable transmittance beam-divergence angle on the bit-error
rate, signal-to-noise ratio, communication link distance is also investigated.

In this paper, point-to-point underwater visible light communication link, which constituted the transmitter,
channel, and the receiver. In this simulation, we consider only forward scattering, no back-reflection of photons
towards the transmitter and no water-air surface reflection. Schematic diagram of underwater visible light
communication link for transmission of plane and Gaussian beam is shown in Fig. 1.
 Fig. 1 Transmission of Light: (a) Gaussian beam, (b) Plane beam

In this paper, performance evaluation of Underwater Visible light communication system is done for variable
transmitter beam divergence angle. Intensity of the optical information signal decreases to 1/ e 2 of the maximum
value at the radius of beam spot ( R0 ). In addition, with beam spot radius ( R0 ), radius of curvature (C 0) which is
responsible for specifying the formation of optical beam, can also be used to characterize the Gaussian beam
propagating along z-axis at the transmitter. Beam divergence angle (Փ) is spreading of optical beam can be
defined as:

λ (1)
Փ=
π RB
Where λ is the wavelength of the optical beam and R B shows the spot size radius at the beam waist, describe as
the minimum radius of optical beam along the propagating path which is given as follows:

R0 (2)

( )
2 1
RB = k R0 2
[ +1]
2 C0
Range of Փ depends on the total internal reflection angle, which varies from Փmin to Փ c. In this paper,
iterations based on this range is done. Total internal reflection takes place at the incidence medium I when it is
denser than the transmission medium II; ղ I > ղ II .

Փ c = sin −1( ղ II / ղ I ) (3)

During total internal reflection, all incident light reflects from the medium I-II interface. In this paper, the only
condition to select Փ is that it should be lie in between Փ min to Փ c. Hence, I have chosen randomly four values
which lie in between Փ min to Փ c.

Fig. 2 Underwater Visible light communication (UVLC) link

scenario

In this paper, different values of transmitter field of views (FOVs) are considered and presented in Table 3.
Table 3: Simulated transmitter FOVs
FOV (Փ) 30° 50° 85° 115°

Results:
 Fig. 4(a): log(BER) Vs distance graph for PIN photodetector for Fig. 4(b): log(BER) Vs SNR graph for PIN photodetector for
different transmittance beam divergence angle value for amplitude different transmittance beam divergence angle value for amplitude
modulation scheme. modulation scheme.

Fig. 5(a): log(BER) Vs distance graph for APD photodiode for Fig. 5(b) log(BER) Vs distance graph for APD photodiode
different transmittance beam divergence angle value for AM for different transmittance beam divergence angle value for
scheme. AM scheme.
Hence, we can conclude that narrower beam covers longer distance with less SNR which will be beneficial for
long-distance underwater visible light communication system. We can support error-free transmission at 1Gbps
for the parameters used in this simulation with minimum SNR value. It also shows that as the beam divergence
angle decreases, performance of underwater wireless communication system increases. To alleviate the effect of
beam divergence optical scanners are used, which provide needed beam size. Another thing is collimator, which
can also be used for communication system with various laser diodes to improve the effect of beam divergence.

References

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2. Pandey, Priya, Gunjan Matta, and Monika Aggarwal. "Performance comparisons between Avalanche
and PIN photodetectors for use in underwater optical wireless communication systems." OCEANS
2021: San Diego–Porto. IEEE, 2021.
3. Pandey, Priya, Gunjan Matta, and Monika Aggarwal. "Investigation of photodetector responsivity on the
performance of underwater optical wireless communication systems." OCEANS 2022-Chennai. IEEE,
2022.
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