Shintaro Arai

Experimental on Hierarchical Transmission Scheme for Visible Light Communication using LED Traffic Light and High-Speed Camera

LEDs are expected as lighting sources for next generation, and data transmission system using LEDs attract attention. In this paper, we present hierarchical coding scheme using LED traffic lights and high-speed camera for intelligent transport systems (ITS) application. Further, if each of LEDs in traffic lights is individually modulated, parallel data transmissions are possible using a camera as a reception device. Such parallel LED-camera channel can be modeled as spatial low-pass filtered channel of which the cut-off frequency varies according to the distance. To overcome, we propose hierarchical coding scheme based on 2D fast Haar wavelet transform. As results, the proposed hierarchical transmission schemes outperform the conventional on-off keying and the reception of high priority data is guaranteed even LED-camera distance is further.

A New Automotive VLC System Using Optical Communication Image Sensor

As a new technology for next-generation vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication, visible-light communication (VLC) using light-emitting diode (LED) transmitters and camera receivers has been energetically studied. Toward the future in which vehicles are connected anytime and anywhere by optical signals, the cutting-edge camera receiver employing a special CMOS image sensor, i.e., the optical communication image sensor (OCI), has been prototyped, and an optical V2V communication system applying this OCI-based camera receiver has already demonstrated 10-Mb/s optical signal transmission between real vehicles during outside driving. In this paper, to reach a transmission performance of 54 Mb/s, which is standardized as the maximum data rate in IEEE 802.11p for V2X communication, a more advanced OCI-based automotive VLC system is described. By introducing optical orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (opticalOFDM), the new system achieves a more than fivefold higher data rate. Additionally, the frequency response characteristics and circuit noise of the OCI are closely analyzed and taken into account in the signal design. Furthermore, the forward-current limitation of an actual LED is also considered for long operational reliability, i.e., the LED is not operated in overdrive. Bit-error-rate experiments verify a system performance of 45 Mb/s without bit errors and 55 Mb/s with BER <; 10-5.

Range estimation scheme for integrated I2V-VLC using a high-speed image sensor

High-speed image sensors, designed for machine vision and control, provide the “eyes” for autonomous and connected vehicle. A noteworthy feature of high-speed image sensors is their ability to be used as a reception device for visible light communication (VLC) signals. Due to the massive number of pixels available and the ability to spatially separate sources, a signal-receiving pixel in the image sensor plane represents the actual position of the transmitter. The VLC signal can be represented not only by a VLC time domain signal but also by the position of the transmitter. In this paper, we propose a robust range estimation scheme that integrates with a VLC function for infrastructure-to-vehicle visible light communication (I2V-VLC). The scheme is composed of an LED array transmitter and a high-speed image sensor receiver. It measures a range by taking phase-only correlation (POC) and avoids vehicle vibration from road irregularity. Field trials confirm an accuracy range of 0.3 m, even on rough road conditions, with the measurement time of 2 ms, which is much faster than that of light detection and ranging (LIDAR).

Modeling and parameter estimation of vehicle vibration inducing transmitter displacement in ITS image sensor communication

Image sensor communication (ISC), which is derived from visible light communication (VLC), is a novel form of wireless communication that uses an image sensor as a receiver. ISC is an attractive solution for outdoor mobile environments and is particularly well-suited to intelligent transport systems (ITS). The purpose of this paper is to derive the dominant components of vehicle vibrations and road surface irregularities that induce transmitter displacement in ITS-ICS in paved road scenarios. Such displacements make it difficult for a ISC receiver to select the correct pixels. We measured vehicle vibrations during an actual driving scenario using a six-axis acceleration sensor installed in a smartphone. Using the results obtained, we performed a frequency analysis of the vehicle vibrations and determined the parameters of vehicle vibrations based on the frequency characteristics. This paper explains that the vehicle vibrations that affect the communication performance can be modeled by solely using Gaussian random processes when a high frame rate (e.g. 1000 fps) image sensor is used as the ISC receiver.

The Uplink Visible Light Communication Beacon System for Universal Traffic Management

This paper presents a feasibility study of the uplink visible light communication (VLC) beacon system for the universal traffic management system (UTMS). The UTMS is a traffic management system beneath the National Police Agency of Japan. Currently, 55 000 UTMS infrared beacon systems have been installed, and they provide expressway and ordinary road information to cars. However, the data rate is 1 Mbps, and a faster data rate is necessary to support automotive and smart mobility devices. In this paper, we propose an uplink V2I system for the UTMS. The system is designed to match the current beacon system as closely as possible, so that the system can easily be replaced and still provide sufficient bandwidth for future automotive and smart mobility devices. We adopt a photo diode (PD) as the VLC receiver and a commercially available off-the-shelf LED headlight as a transmitter. Unfortunately, the bandwidth of such an LED is usually small, so we consider applying a bit-loading algorithm to direct-current-biased optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing. To reduce strong background noise, such as from the sun, we narrow down the field-of-view by applying a lens to the PD, which forms a tiny communication area, smaller than the current infrared beacon system. We then consider multiple PDs with the lens to create a similar communication area as the infrared beacon system. As a result, we achieve 3.1-Mbps throughput.

Development of low-complexity MLE method for image-sensor-based visible light communication

In this paper, we focus on the visible light communication (VLC) using an LED (transmitter) and a high-speed image sensor (receiver) for an intelligent transport system (ITS). The receiver of this system suffers from an inability to detect the correct luminance values of each LED since the image captured by the receiver blurs owing to defocusing. To overcome this problem, our previous study proposed a data demodulation method from blurred images by using the maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) method. However, this method requires high complexity as the number of LEDs increases. In this paper, we propose a demodulation method whose performance approaches the MLE method with significantly reduced complexity. The proposed method first apply the MMSE estimation to discern each LEDs condition. According to the results of the estimation, we divide symbols from each LED into high reliability symbols and low reliability symbols. If the symbol is categorized as high reliability symbol, we demodulate data based on the result. On the other hand, if the symbol is categorized as low reliability symbol, we apply the MLE method to the LEDs who have low reliability symbols to demodulate data. We conduct computer simulation and compare the performance of the proposed method with the previous (MLE) one.