STTR PHASE I: High Performance Signal Generation and Data Encoding for Fiber Distributed 60 GHz WPANs

This STTR Phase I research project will develop new enabling technologies for the realization of an integrated fiberoptic wireless network architecture for future millimeter-wave (mm-wave) wireless personal area networks (WPANs). To fully enable the diversity of bandwidth-demanding services for a large number of users or terminals communicating over shorter distances, a mm-wave WPAN architecture that can accommodate multi-gigabit-per-second data rates and multiple radio coverage areas is essential. The integration of a mm-wave WPAN with a fiber-optic signal distribution scheme provides an efficient means to deliver the required high data rate signals to a large number of radio distribution access points and ensure optimized radio coverage. An optical technique for generating the mm-wave WPAN signals that results in a low phase noise RF carrier after conversion back into the RF domain is essential. Also, the transport of the 60 GHz WPAN signals over fiber must be tolerant to the potential impact of fiber chromatic dispersion on the signal to noise ratio of the recovered wireless signal. New photonic technologies and system architectures are needed that will satisfy the WPAN physical layer requirements. In addition to directly benefiting consumers by providing the ready availability of new bandwidth intensive services via an affordable, efficient, flexible and scalable network architecture with optimized radio coverage, the technology will directly provision new communication services as well as acquire untethered connectivity to future high capacity multimedia communications. The application of the newly invented technologies to other wireless systems will provide additional benefits. The inherent security provided by 60 GHz radio links may also be of direct benefit to organizations such as law enforcement agencies, homeland security, financial institutions and medical institutions, for which the secure transmission of data is critical.