International Journal on Communications (IJC) Volume 3, 2014

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Effects of Backscattering and Atmospheric

Scintillation on OFDM Based Optical
Wireless Communication
S. R. Sabuj, 2Md. Mahfujul Hasan and 3Md. Jakir Hossain

Department of EEE, Bangladesh University, Dhaka, Bangladesh

Department of CSE, Metropolitan University, Sylhet, Bangladesh
3Department of CSE, Metropolitan University, Sylhet, Bangladesh
1
2

saifuriict@gmail.com; 2mahfuz_dk@yahoo.com; 3md.jakir.sub@gmail.com

Abstract
Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) based
optical wireless communication (OWC) is a viable
technology and has been widely applied in indoor as well as
outdoor communication. Atmospheric scintillation and
backscattering are the main impairments in OWC.
Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) has
been widely used in the optical wireless communication.
Nevertheless, due to both frequency offset and phase noise,
the performance of OFDM can severely be affected. The
combined effect of atmospheric scintillation, backscattering,
frequency offset and phase noise has been investigated in
OFDM based OWC. As the value of backscattering power
and atmospheric scintillation increase, the BER also increases
and thus degradation of performance occurs.
Keywords
Atmospheric Scintillation; Backscattering; Frequency Offset;
Optical Wireless Communication; Orthogonal Frequency Division
Multiplexing and Phase Noise

Introduction
The demand of portable wireless communication
device is increasing when the available bandwidth is
limited. Optical wireless communications (OWC) offer
a feasible alternative to radio frequency (RF) communication for indoor as well as outdoor applications [D.
Kedar and S. Arnon 2003, R. M S R. Pir and M. M. Hasan
2011]. The main reasons for suitability of an OWC are
enormous amount of unregulated bandwidth, no
license requirement, low cost transceivers and no
interference with sensitive electronic system [D. Tsonev,
S. Sinanovic and H. Haas 2012, Z. Ghassemlooy 2003].
The OFDM system is characterized by superior
flexibility due to high spectral efficiency, high tolerance to multi-path interference, channel dispersion
and frequency-selective fading [I. B. Djordjevic, B. Vasic
and M. A. Neifeld 2007, E. Vanin 2011]. Subcarrier

frequency offset and phase noise cause a number of

impairments including attenuation of the received
OFDM symbols and inter carrier interference (ICI)
which degrade the BER of the system.
The main challenge for OFDM-OWC system is the
performance degradation caused by the atmospheric
scintillation, scattering and backscattering. Scintillation
is fluctuation in the intensity and phase of the received
signal [G. Yan, W. Min and D. Weifeng 2011]. The light
is backscattered from a transmitted beam to the receiver
of the same transceiver. Then the overlap occurs
between the propagating beam and the receiver [D.
Kedar and S. Arnon 2005]. The effect of crosstalk due to
backscattered light is one of the numbers of interference that degrade the signal. Debbie Kedar et al. (2005)
have analyzed the crosstalk effect of aerosol backscatter
on the performance of a wavelength division multiplexed
(WDM) OWC system [D. Kedar and S. Arnon 2005].
In this paper, we have established an analytical model
for OFDM based OWC. The performance of the system
in the presence of backscattered light, atmospheric
scintillation, frequency offset and phase noise has been
evaluated in terms of BER.
System Model
The block diagram of an OFDM based optical wireless
communication system is shown in fig. 1. Input bits
are first encoded by using suitable modulation
technique like - BPSK, QPSK or M-QAM. After the
serial to parallel converter (S/P), the duration of input
bits is increased. The transmitted OFDM signal after
IFFT at the transmitter [Y.-S.Li, H.-G.Ryu, J.-W.Li, D.Y.Sun, H.-Y. Liu, L. J. Zhou and Y. Wu 2008] can be
expressed as,
s (n) =

N 1

k =0

j(

dk e

2
) kn
N

for 0 n N-1

(1)

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International Journal on Communications (IJC) Volume 3, 2014

FIG. 1 OFDM BASED OWC SCHEME (A) TRANSMITTER (B) RECEIVER

Where, j = 1 , N is the total number of subcarriers,

d is data symbol over the kth subcarrier. After IFFT,
k

the data symbols are serialized using a parallel to

serial converter (P/S), then converted to analog via the
digital to analog converter (DAC). An infrared emitter
is used as optical wireless transmitter to generate
optical signal before the transmission of the signal.
Received signal is affected by phase noise and
frequency offset. So, it can be expressed as [Y.-S. Li, H.G.Ryu, J.-W.Li, D.-Y.Sun, H.-Y. Liu, L. J. Zhou and Y.
Wu 2008],

r (n) = [ s (n) h(n) + w(n)]}e j[2ft + ( n )]

expression of r(n), d(n), h(n) . Nk is the complex AWGN.

Here, is the normalized frequency offset and is given
by fT. f is the frequency difference between the
transmitted and received carrier frequencies and T is
the subcarrier symbol period. Using phase noise linear
approximation method [n] is so small that e j [ n ] can
be approximated into 1 + j[n] .So, QL can be defined as
[Y.-S.Li, H.-G.Ryu, J.-W.Li, D.-Y.Sun, H.-Y. Liu, L. J.
Zhou and Y. Wu 2008],
2

QL =

1 N 1 j[( N )( L + ) n + ( n )]
e
N n=0
2

1 N 1 j[( N )( L + ) n ]
(2)
(1 + j (n))
=
e
(4)
N n=0
Where, f and (n) are frequency offset and phase
= exp[{ j ( L + )}(1 1/ N )]
noise. s(n), h(n), w(n), r(n) are transmitted signal,
sin{ ( L + )]
1 N 1
channel impulse response, complex Gaussian noise
{1 +
j (n)}
and received signal respectively. At the receiver, a
N .sin[{ ( L + )} / N ]
N n=0
photodetector collects the optical signal and converts it
Phase noise occurs random drift of received symbol its
to an electrical current. The received symbols are
constellation diagram. Frequency offset and random
passed through low noise amplifier and converted
phase noise signal of OFDM signal become corrupted
from analog to digital using the analog to digital
at the receiving end. It involves two kinds of
converter (ADC) and transferred by the S/P. The FFT
components. One component is its own subcarrier
of the received signal can be expressed as [Y.-S. Li, H.signal corrupted by common phase error and the other
G.Ryu, J.-W.Li, D.-Y.Sun, H.-Y. Liu, L. J. Zhou and Y.
is ICI from adjacent subcarrier signals. Here, the cyclic
Wu 2008],
prefix is not considered for the ease of analysis.
2
j[ ]kn
1 N 1
N
Y (k ) =
r ( n )e
At the receiver, the direct detection (photo detector)
N n=0
process is mathematically equivalent to applying the
2
j[( )( l k + ) n + ( n )]
1 N 1 N 1
N
squared modulus [E. H. Miguel 2010],
(3)
+ Nk
dl H l e
N=n 0=l 0
2
N 1
2
N 1
I =
y (k )
dl H l Ql k + N k
= dl H l Ql k + N k
(5)
l =0
l =0

Where, Y(k), dl and Hl are the frequency domain

2

2
2
= I signal
+ ICI
+ Nk

International Journal on Communications (IJC) Volume 3, 2014

Where, is photodiode efficiency. The average

received current from the signal and the backscattered
interference are I signal and I BS respectively. In order to
evaluate the statistical properties, average channel
gain is assumed [V. K. Dwivedi and G. Singh 2008]

E H l = 1 and E dl = d

(6)

The received signal is generated by the signal of kth

subcarrier. Considering l=k, the received signal power
can be represented by
2

2
I signal
= E[ d k ].E[ H k ]. Q0

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2
2
2
2
112= ASE
ASE + ASE S + ASE BS + S BS=

2 BFn ( PR + PBS ) 1 PR PBS

B ( Fn ) 2 +

.
+
h
2 ( h )2

2
2
=
00
=
ASE ASE

[ q GFn ]2 B

mixing of the signal with the backscatter. The beat

noise terms caused by the mixing of two signals can be
dened as [G. P. Agrawal 1997]
2
=
ASE ASE

[ q GFn ]2 B

(9)

2 Fn
(10)
[ q G ]2 PR B
h
2 Fn
2
(11)
ASE
[ q G ]2 PBS B
BS =
h
1 q G 2
(
) PR PBS
S2 BS =
(12)
2 h
where, q , h , , B, G , Fn are electron charge, Plancks
2
ASE
S =

constant, optical frequency of the received power,

electronic bandwidth, optical amplier gain and noise
factor. Here backscatter is denoted as BS. ID is the
threshold current which is represented by ( I signal +
I BS ) / 2 . PR and PBS are the received power and

backscatter power. Hence, the noise current variances

are given by [G. P. Agrawal 1997]
2
2
=
102 ASE
ASE + ASE S

( q G )2 BFn Fn +

2 PR
h

(13)

2 PBS
h

(14)

2
2
2
=
01
ASE
ASE + ASE BS

( q G )2 BFn Fn +

(15)

(16)

According to the deriving BER expression, all

accompanying noise is independent and Gaussian
distribution. BER of OFDM based optical wireless
communication with Scintillation can be expressed as
[D. Kedar and S. Arnon 2005, G. P. Agrawal 1997],

(7)
=
BER 0.25.erfc
= d k . H k . Q0

ICI is corrupted by adjacent subcarrier signal.

Considering l k , the ICI power is

0.25.erfc
N 1
2
2
2

ICI
= E[ dl ].E[ H l ]. Ql k
=l 0,l k
(8)

N 1
2
2
2
= dl . H l . Ql
0.25.erfc
l =1

2
2
2

The noise terms are ASE

,
and
due
ASE S
ASE BS
ASE

to beating of the amplied spontaneous emission (ASE)

0.25.erfc
from the optical amplier with itself, the signal and the

2
backscatter respectively. sig bs is the noise due to the
2

( q G )2

+
2
2
2 0.5

2 10 + ICI + s

I signal + I BS I D
+
2
2
2 0.5

2 11 + ICI + s

I signal I D

I D I BS
+
2
2
2 0.5

2 01 + ICI + s

ID

2
2
2 0.5

2 00 + ICI + s

(17)

Results and Discussion

According to the theoretical analysis, performance
results of OFDM-OWC system are presented in the
following section. The performance of OFDM-OWC
system in the presence of backscattering power,
atmospheric scintillation, normalized frequency offset
and phase noise has been evaluated in terms of BER.
The values of system parameters are given in table 1.
TABLE 1 VALUES OF NUMERICAL PARAMETERS

Parameter
Electronic Bandwidth, B
Amplifier Gain, G
Noise Figure, Fn
Photodiode Efficiency,
Optic Frequency (central),
Optic Bandwidth,

Typical value
500 (MHz)
1000 (30 dB)
2.238 (4 dB)
0.8
1.94x1014 (Hz)
125 (GHz)

The effect of backscattering optical power on BER is

shown in Fig. 2. It is seen that OFDM-OWC show
better performance without backscattering optical
power. Again, backscattering and atmospheric
scintillation have no impact when s2 6dBm . But, for

s2 6dBm , OFDM-OWC performs better without

backscattering and atmospheric scintillation.
The plots of BER versus received power with different
scintillation s2 are shown in fig. 3. It is obviously

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noticed that the amount of degradation in BER

performance due to scintillation is very significant at a
given BER. For example, at a BER = 1.4 x102 , the
required receiver sensitivity is almost 6 dBm

International Journal on Communications (IJC) Volume 3, 2014

high power. When s2 0.01 , there exist no effects of

scintillation.

corresponding to s2 = 103 where as it increases to

about 6 dBm and 8.6 dBm corresponding to s2 = 103
and s2 = 102 respectively.

FIG. 4 EFFECT OF FREQUENCY OFFSET ON BER

FIG. 2 EFFECT OF DIFFERENT BACKSCATTERING OPTICAL

POWER ON BER

Fig. 4 shows the comparison of the performance BER

and different normalized frequency offset while phase
noise is constant. As normalized frequency offset
increases, BER increases dramatically. These results
show that degradation of performance increases with
normalized frequency offset. In normalized frequency
offset 0.025 and 1.75, the values of BER in OFDM-OWC
are approximately 7.9 102 and 1.3 101 respectively
at 12 dBm.

FIG. 3 EFFECT OF ATMOSPHERIC SCINTILLATION ON BER

The fig. 3 illustrates clearly that OFDM-OWC

systemrealize high speed communication when s2 is
small. When s2 0.01 , we get lower BER. On the other
hand, s2 0.01 we found higher BER. This is because
there exist the effects of scintillation; there is a
possibility thatthe interference power becomes larger
than the desired userspower even in the regime of
4

FIG. 5 EFFECT OF PHASE NOISE ON BER

Fig. 5 shows the effect of phase noise on BER due to

invariable normalized frequency offset. As the value of
phase noise increases, the BER also increases and thus

International Journal on Communications (IJC) Volume 3, 2014

degradation of performance increases with normalized

frequency offset and phase noise.
Conclusion
An analytical approach is used to evaluate the
combined influence of backscattered light, atmospheric
scintillation, frequency offset and phase noise in the
BER performance of OFDM based OWC with IM/DD
scheme. Numerical results show that the effect of
backscattering is significant. Not only backscattering
but also scintillation is an important factor in favor of
OFDM-OWC which degrades the scheme performance.
The frequency offset and phase noise has a noteworthy
effect on the BER performance. OFDM has more
advantages, more suitable for future optical wireless
communication scheme in the removal the channel
impairments.
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