Single and multiple transceiver simulation modules for free-space optical channel in tropical Malaysian weather

Abstract

Free space optics (FSO) is an optical communication technology that uses light propagating in free space to transmit data for telecommunications or computer networking, and is exposed to atmospheric attenuation, like absorption and scattering. These types of attenuations seriously degrade the strength of transmitted signal, especially when single beam FSO system is used. So to overcome this problem, a multiple beam FSO transceiver system has become dominance and is usually used. In this paper simulation models are obtained by using average rain attenuation which is evaluated from the five months collected rain intensity data. These models are obtained to demonstrate the results concerning link distance and received optical power of using multiple beam FSO system and comparing it with single beam FSO system. Comparison is carried out in terms of signal to noise ratio (SNR), geometrical losses, atmospheric losses, and bit error rate (BER). From the results it is clear that, by using up to four beams has improved geometrical loss, sensitivity of the receiver, SNR, and link distance.