Dimming-discrete-multi-tone (DMT) for simultaneous color control and high speed visible light communication

Visible light communication (VLC) using LEDs has attracted significant attention recently for the future secure, license-free and electromagnetic-interference (EMI)-free optical wireless communication. Dimming technique in LED lamp is advantageous for energy efficiency. Color control can be performed in the red-green-blue (RGB) LEDs by using dimming technique. It is highly desirable to employ dimming technique to provide simultaneous color and dimming control and high speed VLC. Here, we proposed and demonstrated a LED dimming control using dimming-discrete-multi-tone (DMT) modulation. High speed DMT-based VLC with simultaneous color and dimming control is demonstrated for the first time to the best of our knowledge. Demonstration and analyses for several modulation conditions and transmission distances are performed, for instance, demonstrating the data rate of 103.5 Mb/s (using RGB LED) with fast Fourier transform (FFT) size of 512. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America