CAREER: Towards Practical Mobile Visible Light Communication

该奖项的全部或部分资金来自《2021年美国救援计划法案》(公法117-2)。可见光通信(VLC)是一种利用光(光)能量进行通信的新兴技术。VLC在研发方面越来越受欢迎，但要成为一项独立的移动技术，仍有很大差距需要填补。这些差距特别是在提高通信数据速率和范围、使该技术适用于移动条件以及调整该技术用于低能量电池供电操作方面。今天，VLC的开发工作在很大程度上局限于全球有限的几个研究实验室，从而使这项技术变得不那么容易获得和为公众所知。这也使没有在VLC教学和/或研究的基础设施和知识基础的学术部门的学生和教职员工处于非常不利的地位。该项目的总体愿景是将VLC实现为一种实用的无线商业移动技术，该项目执行一项计划，通过一套统一的研究、教育和推广活动来实现这一目标。该项目研究和设计了提高吞吐量的机器学习模型，设计了在移动性下维护VLC链路的新技术，设计了VLC发送和接收的能量感知策略，并在受控和真实条件下通过原型实现实验验证了解决方案。同时，该项目开展了与研究工作紧密结合的教育推广活动，为本科生开发了研究经验，并设计了一种新的VLC实践学习工具包，供公众免费使用。该项目的五年研究和教育计划侧重于解决在现实世界应用中的实际限制下实现可靠和强大的VLC的根本障碍。VLC性能的目标是中长距离、兆兆位每秒吞吐量以及在静态和移动条件下的电池运行。为了实现这些目标，该项目使用实验和数据驱动的方法，通过一套综合研究和教育活动实现，这五个关键目标是：1)使用新的传输和接收技术实现高吞吐量和远距离；使用新硬件和传感器融合构建移动性弹性；3)使用新颖的信号设计和低能耗通信协议优化能源使用；原型实施和实验评估；以及5.)加强VLC教育和外展。VLC学习工具包为VLC研究社区和公众创建了一个新的资源。REU的努力对亚特兰大的URM学生和佐治亚州立大学的大量非裔美国人和西班牙裔学生产生了直接影响。总体而言，该项目激励社区在现实条件下研究和运营VLC。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2).Visible Light Communication (VLC) is an emerging technology that uses light (optical) energy to communicate. VLC is increasing in popularity for research and development, however, still has significant gaps to cover to become a standalone mobile technology. These gaps are particularly in improving communication data rates and range, making the technology viable for mobile conditions, and conditioning the technology for low-energy battery sourced operation. Today, the development efforts in VLC have largely been confined within a limited set of research labs around the globe, thus making the technology less accessible and known to the public. This also puts students and faculty from academic departments which do not have the infrastructure and knowledge--base to teach and/or research in VLC at a great disadvantage. With an overarching vision to realize VLC as a practical wireless commercial mobile technology, this project executes a plan to achieve this goal through a unified set of integrated research, education, and outreach activities. This project studies and designs machine learning models to improve throughput, design novel techniques for maintaining VLC links under mobility, designs energy-aware strategies for VLC transmission and reception, and experimentally validates the solutions through prototype implementations under controlled and real-world conditions. In parallel, this project performs educational outreach that is well-integrated with the research efforts, by developing research experiences for undergraduates (REU) and designing a novel VLC hands-on learning kit to be made freely accessible to the public.This project’s five-year research and education plan focuses on addressing the fundamental impediments for realizing reliable and robust VLC under practical constraints in real world applications. The target goals for VLC performance are medium-long ranges, Mega-Giga bits-per-second throughput and battery operation under static and mobile conditions. To achieve these goals, this project uses an experimentation and data driven approach realized through a set of integrated research and educational activities along five key objectives, which are: 1.) Achieving High Throughput and Long Range using novel transmission and reception techniques; 2.) Building Mobility Resilience using novel hardware and sensor-fusion; 3.) Optimizing Energy Usage using novel signal designs and low-energy communication protocols; 4.) Prototype Implementation and Experimental Evaluation; and 5.) Enhance VLC Education and Outreach. The VLC learning kit creates a new resource for the VLC research community and the public. The REU efforts create a direct impact on URM students in Atlanta and Georgia State University’s large population of African-American and Hispanic students. Overall, this project motivates the community to study and operate VLC in real-world conditions.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.