Integrated Circuit System-On-Chip And System-In-A-Package For Visible Light Communications And Navigation

Tech ID: 32653 / UC Case 2014-812-0

Patent Status

Country Type Number Dated Case
United States Of America Issued Patent 10,244,590 03/26/2019 2014-812
 

Full Description

Background

Wireless Visible Light Communication (VLC) is enabled by Light Emitting Diodes (LED) and their ability to switch on/off at tens of MHz without flickering. Visible Light Communication offers significant advantages over Radio Frequency (RF) based wireless communication.

  • Optical spectrum offers a bandwidth upto 300 THz thereby allowing for streaming at multiple gigabits per second.
  • Data rates can be boosted with more emission power without harm to human beings.
  • Unable to penetrate walls, VLC is inherently secure.
  • Being interference free, VLC can co-exist with and complement existing RF technology.
  • VLC devices are inexpensive compared to multi-gigahertz RF devices.

Current VLC systems are essentially a Lego-type testbed that have significant disadvantages. These include:

  • Large size and complex electronics.
  • Low performance, low reliability and high cost.

Current Invention

Prof. Wang at UCR has developed a patented, system-in-a-package (SIP) and system-on-a-chip (SoC) architecture for VLC that integrates all the electronic circuits with the LEDs and photodetectors (PD) to make VLC and Visible Light Positioning (VLP) systems with integrated opto-electronics.

Smart traffic

A VLC-based Ad Hoc smart traffics system scenario.

 

Smart hospitals

Illustration of an LED-based VLC system scenario for smart hospitals using a given hospital layout.

Advantages

The novelty and benefits of this design and architecture are:

  • Small footprint and low cost.
  • Very high performance and reliability.
  • With integrated Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM), larger LED array and demultiplexer, the design will offer better signal quality and wider bandwidth.
  • A larger PD array combined with CMOS/CCD imager offers higher data rates.
  • Low voltage differential signaling (LVDS) removes background noise.

Suggested uses

  • Smart cities
  • Smart wireless communication in:
    • RF prohibited hospital setting
    • Smart traffic control, car-to-car collision avoidance and signal data broadcasting
    • Home/Office with higher security, bandwidth, and data rate
    • Retail/Store setting
  • Ubiquitous energy efficient computing & Greener broadband wireless communication
  • Video streaming over light
  • Smart locks

State Of Development

Prototype built and tested

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Other Information

Keywords

Big data transmission, Data transfer, Broadband wireless, LED, Photodetector, Visible light communication, Visible light positioning, Wireless communication, Smart locks

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