We propose a new receiving method for an information-providing system that uses LED-based traffic lights as the transmitter. We analyzed the improvements obtained when 2-dimentional image sensor replaced the conventional single-element photodiode. First, we discuss the maximum receiver's field of view (FOV) when using the 2-dimentional image sensor at a particular focal length. We analyzed the best vertical inclination for both lanes and quantified the improvements in terms of the enhancement of received signal-noise ratio (SNR) when different numbers of pixels were applied. Our results indicate that using more pixels increases the received SNR and the service area becomes wider compared to the conventional single-element system. Consequently, receivable information within the service area also increased. We also found that the optimum number of pixels to accomplish a reliable communication system is 5050 because performance degradation occured with a larger number of pixels.

We have developed a new modulation method--inverted pulse position modulation (I-PPM) and subcarrier inverted pulse position modulation (SC-I-PPM)--that provides superior LED brightness for visible-light communications. In addition, the new modulation method SC-I-PPM is not affected by background light. In this paper, we investigated several modulation methods in details and set up a standard with which to evaluate the performance of modulation methods. Several modulation methods are subjected to experiments to clarify their performance. Experiments show that subcarrier modulation suppresses the influence of background light and that our new modulation best maintains LED brightest.

Future electric lights will be comprised of white LEDs (Light Emitting Diodes). White LEDs with a high power output are expected to serve in the next generation of lamps. In this paper, an indoor visible data transmission system utilizing white LED lights is proposed. In the proposed system, these devices are used not only for illuminating rooms but also for an optical wireless communication system. This system is suitable for private networks such as consumer communication networks. However, it remains necessary to investigate the properties of white LEDs when they are used as optical transmitters. Based on numerical analyses and computer simulations, it was confirmed that the proposed system could be used for indoor optical transmission.

This study introduces an image sensor based visible light communication (VLC) and its application to pose, position, and range estimations. There are two types of visible-light receiver: a photodiode and an image sensor. A photodiode is usually used as a reception device of VLC, and an image sensor consisting of a large number of pixels can also be used as a VLC reception device. A photodiode detects the signal intensity of incoming light, while an image sensor not only detects the incoming signal intensity but also an accurate angle of arrival of light emitted from a visible light transmitter such as a white LED light. After angles of arrival of light are detected by an image sensor, positioning and data reception can be performed. The ability of an image sensor to detect an accurate angle of arrival will provide attractive applications of VLC such as pose, position calculation, and range estimation. Furthermore, because the image sensor has the ability to spatially separate sources, outdoor positioning even with strong sunlight is possible by discarding the associated pixels of noise sources.

There are demands for high-speed and stable ground-to-train optical communication as a network environment for trains. The existing ground-to-train optical communication system developed by the authors uses a camera and a QPD (Quadrant photo diode) to capture beacon light. The problem with the existing system is that it is impossible to identify the ground station. In the system proposed in this paper, a beacon light modulated with the ID of the ground station is transmitted, and the ground station is identified by demodulating the image from the dual-port camera on the opposite side. In this paper, we developed an actual system and conducted experiments using a car on the road. The results showed that only one packet was lost with the ping command every 1 ms near handover. Although the communication device itself has a bandwidth of 100 Mbps, the throughput before and after the handover was about 94 Mbps, and only dropped to about 89.4 Mbps during the handover.

This paper investigates the problem of finding the optimal access point placement in simultaneous broadcast system using orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) for public access wireless LAN with micrometer or millimeter frequency band. We define our design criteria such that the quality of service is provided uniformly throughout a given service area. The optimal access point placement with a uniform quality of service was obtained by setting the cost function as the combination of a standard deviation of BER and the average of BER in a very fast simulated annealing algorithm. We applied the algorithm to the cases of fixed and mobile terminals, and obtained optimal access point placement results for both cases.

There is a strong demand to enjoy broadband and stable Internet connectivity not only in office and the home but also in high-speed train. Several systems are providing high-speed train with Internet connectivity using various technologies such as leaky coaxial cable (LCX), Wi-Fi, and WiMAX. However, their actual throughputs are less than 2Mbps. We developed a free-space optical (FSO) communication transceiver called LaserTrainComm2014 that achieves the throughput of 1 Gbps between the ground and a train. LaserTrainComm2014 employs a high-speed image sensor for coarse tracking and a quadrant photo-diode (QPD) for accurate tracking. Since the image captured by the high-speed image sensor has several types of noise, image processing is necessary to detect the beacon light of the other LaserTrainComm2014. As a result of field experiments in a vehicle test course, LaserTrainComm2014 achieves handover time of 21 milliseconds (ms) in the link layer at the speed of 60km/h. Even if the network layer signaling takes time of 10 milliseconds, the total communication disruption time due to handover is short enough to provide passengers with Internet connectivity for live streaming Internet applications such as YouTube, Internet Radio, and Skype.

To promote the commercial implementation of software download for software defined radio (SDR) terminals, a secure method of download is vital. This paper examines the needs of software download for SDR, and proposes a comprehensive system framework within which secure download can be carried out. The features of the proposed system include unique individual encryption to each terminal and secure exchangeability of any cryptographic components. The main goals of the security system are the following: (i) verification of the identity of the source of the software; (ii) control and verification of the integrity of the downloaded data; (iii) disabling of the ability to run unauthorized software on the software defined terminal; (iv) secrecy of the transmitted data. The proposed system is flexible and in harmony with current requirements regarding the SDR security issues.

This paper discusses a design methodology suitable for the development of software defined radio platforms. A flexible digital receiver was designed and implemented using a multi-port direct converter and an FPGA-based platform. The design starts with a hardware-oriented top-level system model. The model is built based on basic signal processing blocks connected together in a graphical tool. Carrier symbol timing recovery is implemented in the discrete-time (digital) domain with an interpolator-based synchronizer. Carrier phase and frequency are recovered using a feedback synchronization algorithm (a second-order type-II digital PLL). Experimental results of the platform and its simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed design methodology.