The central aim of the project is the design of a novel simple structure for a communication base station. Its operation will be based on off-the-shelf optical components such as white LEDs, laser-diodes and photo-diodes.
One of the key concepts for increasing the capacity of radio frequency (RF) communication networks, and the coverage for users is the use of small cells, through femtocell networks. Small cells can lead to significant reduction of the power consumption at the base stations. In optical wireless systems, the concept of optical attocells is proposed for high-speed networking via light-emitting diodes (LEDs).
The key-element of the receiver can be a solar panel able to operate not only as energy harvester, but also as data detector.
The project results will contribute to the analysis of the trade-off between the complexity, cost and performance for the optical wireless power transfer from a central unit to a base station. The novelty of this project will be the remote power transfer from the central unit to the base station. This specific concept could pave the way for energy-autonomous small cells, and contribute to a rapid increase in their use. The capacity and the coverage of the networks would be strongly enhanced and would help to meet the exponential increase in demand for wireless data communication.
