How FSO Transmission Works

In free space optical communication, data is transmitted using optical carriers generated by laser diodes or light emitting diodes in the infrared spectrum around 800nm. The lasers are directed by a narrow beam transceiver through a transmitter telescope onto a receiver telescope. The receiver then detects the intensity of the received light using a photodetector and converts it back into an electrical signal containing the transmitted data. At the physical layer, FSO technology utilizes various modulation techniques like on-off keying (OOK) to encode binary data onto the optical carrier signal. Forward error correction coding is also employed to boost reliability over the wireless link.

Advantages of FSO over Conventional Wireless

One of the major advantages of Free Space Optics Communication over RF wireless technologies is its ability to support significantly higher bandwidth potential in the multi-gigabit range. This higher capacity allows it to meet the growing demand for bandwidth driven by increased use of technologies like 4G/5G cellular, cloud infrastructure, and video conferencing. Additionally, FSO transmissions have less interference and experience a smaller delay spread compared to RF which makes them compatible with latency-sensitive applications. Regulations concerning frequency licensing and spectrum availability also do not apply to FSO technology. It provides a secured and unregulated wireless transmission medium that is free from RF interference and eavesdropping issues.

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