OFDM-Based Generalized Optical MIMO

The combination of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) transmission and orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) modulation has been shown to be an effective way to substantially enhance the capacity of bandlimited optical wireless communication (OWC) systems. In this paper, we propose four OFDM-based generalized optical MIMO techniques for intensity modulation/direct detection (IM/DD) OWC systems, including OFDM-based frequency-domain generalized spatial modulation (FD-GSM), frequency-domain generalized spatial multiplexing (FD-GSMP), time-domain generalized spatial modulation (TD-GSM) and time-domain generalized spatial multiplexing (TD-GSMP). For OFDM-based FD-GSM and FDGSMP, spatial mapping is performed in the frequency domain, while it is carried out in the time domain for OFDM-based TDGSM and TD-GSMP. To efficiently estimate both spatial and constellation symbols in each OFDM-based generalized optical MIMO technique, a corresponding maximum-likelihood (ML) detection algorithm is designed. Extensive simulations are conducted to evaluate and compare the performance of the proposed four OFDM-based generalized optical MIMO techniques in a typical indoor environment. Simulation results demonstrate the superiority of OFDM-based TD-GSM and TD-GSMP for various spectral efficiencies of 4, 5 and 6 bits/s/Hz, when a relatively high secondary direct current (DC) bias is adopted.