CRII: NeTS OP: A Software Defined Approach to Laser-based Free Space Optical Networks

自由空间光通信(FSO)使用高度定向的激光束而不是无线电频率来传输数据。FSO通信，特别是对于无线网络，其传输的带宽本质上可以是非常低的成本。然而，尽管有如此明显的优势，FSO链路在移动无线网络中却很少使用。该奖项旨在调查这一现象的主要原因，即高波束对准延迟，这构成了在移动网络中部署FSO的主要障碍。该项目将探索几个创新的解决方案：使用最先进的可编程光学元件将光束分割成任意图案并帮助更快地对准光束，利用这一新功能以更快地发送数据的网络协议，以及实施这些技术的新型低成本硬件平台。这项工作的结果可以提高无线回程解决方案的性能，有望成为新兴接入网体系结构的基础。作为拟议研究的一部分，鼓励代表人数不足的少数群体参与这一项目。这个项目的研究成果将通过为研究生开发一门关于自由空间光通信的专题课程来回滚到课程中。在这个项目中，利用可编程和可调谐的衍射光学元件来减少对准延迟和增加吞吐量，而新的算法协调了关于指向、捕获和跟踪技术的文献和多跳射频域邻居发现算法。将开发一种用于软件定义无线电的新型FSO前端，能够进行相干光通信，以利用上述增强功能。将从硬件设计阶段学到的经验中提取模拟器模型，并将其反馈给研究社区。

Free space optical (FSO) communications uses highly directional laser beams instead of radio frequencies to communicate data. FSO communication, especially for wireless networks, can be very low cost in nature for the bandwidth delivered. However, in spite of such obvious advantages, FSO links are rarely used in mobile wireless networks. This award seeks to investigate the leading cause of this phenomenon, namely the high beam alignment delay which poses a major roadblock to the deployment of FSO in mobile networks. Several innovative solutions will be explored in this project: the use of state of the art programmable optical elements that can split the beam into arbitrary patterns and help align the beams quicker, networking protocols that leverage this new capability in order to send data faster, and a novel low cost hardware platform that implements these techniques. Results from this work can improve the performance of the wireless backhaul solutions which is expected to be the basis of emerging access network architectures. As part of the proposed research, participation of underrepresented minorities will be encouraged by involving them in this project. The research outcomes from this project will be rolled back into curricula through the development of a special topics course for graduate students on free space optical communication.In this project, programmable and tunable diffractive optical elements are leveraged to reduce the alignment delay and increase throughput, while new algorithms reconcile the literature on pointing, acquisition & tracking techniques with multi-hop RF-domain neighbor discovery algorithms. A novel FSO frontend for software defined radios, capable of coherent optical communication, will be developed to take advantage of the above enhancements. A simulator model will be extracted from the lessons learned during the hardware design phase, and fed back into the research community.