Osac 3 11 3125

Research Article Vol. 3, No.
11 / 15 November 2020 / OSA Continuum 3125
On BER analysis of nonlinear VLC systems

under ambient light and imperfect/outdated CSI
S ANDESH J AIN , 1,3 R ANGEET M ITRA , 2,4 AND V IMAL B HATIA 1,5
1 Disciplineof Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Indore, India
2 PostDoc, Ecole de technologie superieure, University of Quebec, Montreal, Canada
3 phd1601202004@iiti.ac.in
4 rangeet.mitra.1@ens.etsmtl.ca
5 vbhatia@iiti.ac.in
Abstract: Visible light communication (VLC) has emerged as a promising supplement to

the existing radio frequency (RF) technology, which facilitates high speed communication for
next generation communication systems. Although promising, the performance in a practical
VLC system is severely impaired by ambient light interference. Furthermore, nonlinearity of
light emitting diodes (LEDs) and imperfect/oudated channel state information (CSI) are other
factors that degrade the achievable bit error rate (BER) performance. In this work, an analytical
framework for analyzing the expression for BER of a wide class of modulation techniques
is derived for an impaired VLC system considering: (a) ambient light interference, (b) LED
nonlinearity, and (c) imperfect and outdated CSI. The derived analytical expressions for BER
are validated through extensive computer simulations performed over typical VLC channels.
Lastly, the utility of the derived analytical framework is demonstrated in the context of high
data-rate VLC systems, wherein the performance of DC biased optical orthogonal frequency
division multiplexing (DCO-OFDM) is quantified for VLC links impaired by the aforementioned
degradations.
© 2020 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement
1. Introduction
Visible light communication (VLC) has evolved as a promising supplement to existing RF
technology in indoor scenarios [1–3]. The transmission of signals in a VLC system is achieved
by modulating the intensity of LED luminaries at a speed invisible to the human eye, and
photodetectors are used at the receiver for conversion of optical signal to electrical current. The
various desirable features of VLC over RF based systems are as follows [4,5]: (1) unlicensed and
large bandwidth of the order of terahertz (THz), which alleviates the spectrum-crunch faced by
RF communication systems, (2) cost-effective since LED’s are already present in the existing
infrastructure, which facilitates the two-fold goal of illumination and data transmission, (3) high
security since VLC signals could not penetrate through walls, (4) free from electromagnetic
interference, which makes VLC to be used safely in aircrafts, hospitals, and war sites, (5) high
energy efficiency, and (6) high signal to noise ratio due to the illuminance of several hundred
lux. Due to the aforementioned advantages, VLC’s are used in wide variety of applications
such as light fidelity (Li-Fi) systems [4], vehicle to vehicle (V2V) communication, underwater
communication [6], and internet of things (IoTs) based systems.
However, from recent studies, it has been found that the performance of VLC based systems
severely degrades in the presence of interference due to ambient light [7,8], which reduces
the overall signal to noise ratio (SNR) at the receiver. The work in [9] have designed a VLC
receiver for mitigating ambient light interference. Authors in [7] have derived a closed form
expression for mutual information for VLC systems in the presence of ambient light. However,
the aforementioned works in [7,9] have not done bit error rate (BER) performance analysis for
VLC systems under ambient light interference.
#395807 https://doi.org/10.1364/OSAC.395807
Journal © 2020 Received 21 Apr 2020; revised 11 Jul 2020; accepted 8 Sep 2020; published 2 Nov 2020
Research Article Vol. 3, No. 11 / 15 November 2020 / OSA Continuum 3126
LED nonlinearity [10,11] is another factor which limits the throughput of the overall VLC
system. Initial works on LED nonlinearity were based on characterization of LED nonlinearity
models; prime among them are Rapp’s model [10], Volterra model, Wiener model, and
Hammerstein model [12]. Further studies on VLC were focused towards design of various
pre-distortion [13,14] and post-distortion algorithms [11,12,15] for mitigating LED nonlinearity
[16]. Furthermore, there are various works in the literature based on BER performance analysis
for VLC systems [11,17,18]. Authors in [17] perform a BER analysis for optical wireless systems
impaired by LED nonlinearity. Next, the authors in [11] have proposed post-distortion algorithm
for VLC, and also perform BER analysis for VLC systems impaired by LED nonlinearity. The
authors in [18] have derived a closed form BER expression for VLC systems impaired by LED
nonlinearity and DC-bias error.
Apart from ambient light and LED nonlinearity, imperfect channel state information (CSI)
(attributed to estimation-error), and outdated CSI (attributed to user-mobility/shadowing effects)
[19,20] are the other performance limiting factors, which results in degradation of the overall
BER performance. Various models have been proposed in the literature for modeling user
mobility in VLC systems. Authors in [21] have proposed a mobile VLC channel model using
non-sequential ray tracing whilst considering different trajectories of a user talking on a cell
phone in a room. Next, the authors in [22] have proposed a random waypoint model for VLC
channel with user mobility, and the work in [23] have derived the statistical distribution for VLC
channel with user mobility whilst considering the random orientation of the receiver. However,
exact CSI or statistics of channel due to user mobility is not known at the receiver. Hence, CSI
becomes outdated due to variations in channel gain due to user mobility. Furthermore, authors in
[24] derive a closed form BER expression for VLC systems under imperfect CSI.
The VLC links are further degraded by intersymbol interference, which arises due to limited
modulation bandwidth of LED (i.e., low pass response of LED) [25] particularly in the high
data-rate regime. The resulting effect of finite modulation bandwidth can be mitigated by
using DC biased optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (DCO-OFDM) scheme
[26,27]. The other forms of OFDM for optical systems are: (a) asymmetrically clipped optical
OFDM (ACO-OFDM), (b) ADO-OFDM (combination of DCO-OFDM, and ACO-OFDM) [27].
DCO-OFDM scheme is preferred over ACO-OFDM since it gives better spectral efficiency as
compared to ACO-OFDM. There are several works in the literature based on BER performance
of optical OFDM systems [26,28]. Authors in [26] have evaluated the BER performance for
DCO-OFDM, and ACO-OFDM scheme for various clipping levels. Next, authors in [28] have
derived the BER experssion for DCO-OFDM scheme over precoded massive MIMO channel.
There are various other works in the literature based on BER performance analysis for VLC
systems. The work in [29] have done BER analysis for non orthogonal multiple access (NOMA)
VLC systems using conventional modulation techniques like M-ary pulse amplitude modulation
(M-PAM) and M-ary quadrature amplitude modulation (M-QAM) while the authors in [30,31]
perform BER analysis for VLC systems using color shift keying (CSK) modulation scheme.
Next, the authors in [32] have derived a closed form BER expression for CSK-VLC systems
impaired by LED nonlinearity, and the work in [31] performs a BER analysis for VLC systems
using circular CSK modulation scheme. Lastly, the authors in [33] have done BER performance
analysis for hybrid power line communication (PLC) and VLC (PLC-VLC) systems, and the
researchers in [34] have derived a closed form BER expression for VLC systems impaired by
signal dependent noise.
However, to the best of author’s belief, none of the prior works reported so far have done the BER
analysis of VLC systems impaired by ambient light, LED nonlinearity, and imperfect/outdated
CSI together. Hence, in this work, for the first time, we attempt to derive the analytical BER for
VLC systems under the aforementioned artifacts.
Contributions: Main contributions of this letter are summarized as follows: (1) The probability
density function (PDF) of the overall additive distortion for a nonlinear impaired VLC link in the
presence of ambient light interference under imperfect and outdated CSI is characterized, (2) An
analytical expression for BER is quantified for VLC systems impaired by ambient light, and LED
nonlinearity for perfect CSI scenario, (3) Using the derived PDF, an analytical expression for
BER is quantified for VLC systems impaired by ambient light, LED nonlinearity, and imperfect
CSI, (4) An analytical expression for BER is derived for VLC systems impaired by ambient light,
LED nonlinearity, and outdated CSI, and (5) In the context of high data-rate VLC links under a
finite modulation bandwidth, the BER performance of DCO-OFDM impaired by ambient light,
LED nonlinearity, and imperfect/outdated CSI is also analyzed in this work.
The derived analytical expressions for BER are validated through Monte-Carlo simulations
performed over realistic VLC channels impaired by imperfect and outdated CSI. A close overlap
is observed between the analytical and simulated BER for various simulation parameters, which
verifies the derived BER analysis in this paper.
Rest of the paper is structured as follows: The considered VLC system model is described
in Section II. The analytical expressions for PDF for the overall additive distortion for a VLC
link impaired by ambient light, LED nonlinearity, and imperfect/outdated CSI are derived in
Section III. The proposed BER analysis for imperfect CSI and outdated CSI is given in Section
IV. Simulation results are given in Section V for validating the presented BER analysis. Finally,
conclusions are drawn in Section VI.
Notations: Following notations are used throughout the paper: Scalars are represented by
simple lowercase characters. R denotes field of real numbers. E{·} denotes the statistical
expectation, and Pr(·) denotes probability of an event. A Gaussian distribution with zero mean,
and variance σ 2 is denoted as N (0, σ 2 ) while a uniform random variable in the range (a, b) is
denoted by U(a, b). γ̃(·, ·) denotes regularized incomplete gamma function, and Γ̃(·, ·) denotes
regularized upper incomplete gamma function. An exponential integral function is denoted as
E1 (·).
2. System model
In this section, the system model is described for a VLC system impaired by ambient light, LED
nonlinearity, and imperfect/outdated CSI. In the first subsection, we describe the system model
for single carrier scheme, and in the next subsection, we describe the system model for multiple
carrier based DCO-OFDM scheme, which is suited for high data rate applications.
2.1. System model for VLC for single carrier scheme

Let x ∈ R be the transmitted symbol drawn from pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) constellation.
Next, an appropriate DC bias is added to the transmitted signal for driving the LEDs in the
forward biased operating region [35]. Biased symbols are then transmitted by the LED, and
passed through the VLC channel. The VLC channel gain h is given as [20,36]
( A (k+1)
e
2 cosk (φ) cos(ψ), 0<φ<Ψc
h = d sin (Ψc )
2
(1)
0 otherwise,
where Ae denotes the effective area of the photodetector (PD), d is the distance between the LED
and the PD, φ, and ψ denote the angle of irradiance, angle of incidence, respectively, Ψc denotes
ln(cos(φ 1 ))
the field-of-view (FOV) for each photodetector, k = − ln(2) 2 is the order of Lambert emission,
where φ 1 is the LED semi angle at half illuminance. Furthermore, nonlinear characteristics of
2
LED is modeled by Rapp’s model as follows [10,37]:

(x−Vth )
 x ≥ Vth
2p1



(x−Vth ) 2p
f (x) =

1+ Vmax (2)

0

x<Vth ,

where Vmax , Vth , and p is saturation voltage, threshold voltage of LED, and knee factor, respectively
[10]. The received signal at the photodiode (PD) (denoted by y) can be written as
y = (h + ∆)f (x) + αn + β(w − k), (3)

| {z }
overall noise
where ĥ = h + ∆ is the estimate of h known at the receiver, and ∆ is the channel estimation error
which can be modeled as follows [19,20]: (1) For imperfect CSI, ∆ can be assumed as Gaussian
distribution N (0, σ∆2 ) [19], and (2) For outdated CSI (which is caused by mobility/shadowing),
∆ can be modeled as a uniform distribution U(−, ) [20], where is the variation range. The
overall noise comprises of two components [38,39]: (1) The thermal noise αn ∼ N {0, α2 } is
modeled as zero mean Gaussian random variable with variance α2 , and (2) w is a Chi-squared
distribution with k degrees of freedom [7,40], which models the interference due to ambient
light (which can be considered as polarized thermal light [40]), and β denotes the attenuation in
ambient light after blue filtering [25]. From Bussgang’s theorem (for decomposition of nonlinear
functions f (x) = ζx + v) [41,42], and after DC-bias cancellation, (3) can be rewritten as
y = hζx + ∆v + ζ∆x + hv + αn + β(w − k), (4)

(x)x}
where ζ = E{fE{x2 }
is the scaling correlation coefficient between x and f (x) (where ζ ∈ [0, 1]),
and v is the nonlinear distortion sequence uncorrelated with x (such that E{xv} = 0), which is
modeled as Gaussian distribution N {0, σv2 } [18], where σv2 = E{f 2 (x)} − ζ 2 E{x2 } is the variance
of v. Hence, the overall additive distortion ñ can be written as
ñ = ∆v + ζ∆x + hv + αn + β(w − k). (5)
2.2. System model for multiple carrier DCO-OFDM scheme

Block diagram of the considered VLC system model for DCO-OFDM scheme is shown in Fig. 1.
First, Hermitian symmetry is imposed on the data symbols. Let
x = [x0 x1 . . . x K −1 x K x∗K −1 . . . x1∗ ]

2 2 2
be the input of IFFT block, where K is the number of subcarriers, and symbols x0 , and x K is set
2
to 0. Let x̃ be the output of IFFT block. Next, cyclic prefix (CP) is added at the beginning of
OFDM symbol to mitigate ISI (length of CP must be greater than maximum delay spread of the
channel). ISI arises from low pass frequency response of the LED [43], which is modeled by a
Lorentzian transfer function. The Lorentzian transfer function is given as follows [44]:
1
H(f ) = (6)
1 + j2πf τ
where τ is the carrier life time, and τ1 is the 3 dB bandwidth of the LED. In this work, the
Lorentzian frequency response of LED is modeled by a Butterworth low pass filter (LPF) with
bandwidth of 20 MHz [25]. After adding the CP, symbols are transmitted through LED via VLC
channel. The received symbol at the photodiode ỹ can be written as:
ỹ = (h̃ + δ) ∗ f (x̃) + αn + β(w − k) (7)
where h̃ is the convolution of Lorentzian LED low pass response, and VLC channel. αn ∼
N {0, α2 I} is the thermal noise, w is the ambient light noise, which is modeled as generalized
Chi-squared distribution with k degrees of freedom. The final output y (after removing CP, and
performing FFT at the receiver, and using Bussgang’s theorem) can be written as [A4]:
y = H̃ζ x̂ + ∆v + ζ∆x̂ + H̃v + αñ + β(w̃ − k̃) (8)
where H̃ is a diagonal matrix whose diagonal elements are N point FFT of h̃, x̂, ∆, ñ, and w̃
denotes FFT of x̃, δ, n, and w, respectively.
Fig. 1. Block diagram of the system model for VLC for DCO-OFDM scheme
In the next section, the PDF of the overall additive interference ñ is characterized, and the
derived expressions for PDF are utilized for BER analysis in further sections.
3. Analytical expressions for PDF of additive distortion

To derive the analytical BER, first the PDF of the overall additive distortion for a VLC system
impaired by ambient light, LED nonlinearity, and imperfect/outdated CSI is characterized in this
section.
3.1. PDF under imperfect CSI

Proposition 1: The overall additive distortion for a VLC link impaired by ambient light, LED
nonlinearity, and imperfect CSI is characterized by the following distribution
q
+ 2(α2 + ζ 2 σ∆2 + h2 σv2 + σ12 )
!
m1
Õ Θ ñ kβ − ui
i
pICSI (ñ) ≈ √ p , (9)
Ñ
i=1
π β
k x
where p(x) = k
1
x 2 −1 e− 2 , ∀x ∈ (0, ∞), ui is the root of ith physicists Hermite polynomial
2 2 Γ( 2k )
√
i!2(i−1) π

Hi (x), Θi = i2 [Hi−1 (ui )]2
is the weight of Hermite polynomial, and σ12 = 1 +1 1 is the overall
σ2 σv2
∆
variance of ∆v.
Proof: Please refer Appendix A.
Corollary of Proposition 1: The PDF of the the overall additive distortion for a VLC link
for perfect CSI scenario under ambient light interference, and LED nonlinearity (denoted by
pPCSI
Ñ
(ñ)) can be found out by substituting variance of channel estimation error σ∆2 = 0 and
σ12 = 0 in (9), and is given as:
m1 p !
PCSI
Õ Θi ñ + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2
pÑ (ñ) ≈ √ p . (10)
i=1
π β
3.2. PDF under outdated CSI

Proposition 2: The PDF of the overall additive distortion for a VLC link impaired by ambient
light, LED nonlinearity, and outdated CSI is given as
m1 Õ
m1 Õ
N Õ
M
1 Õ −1
pOCSI
Ñ
(ñ) ≈ √ Θi Θj an am bm 2
2πζA i=1 j=1 n=1 m=1
σ
p
√ v vj − ζA + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 )
" !
k ñ − 2bn bm
× Γ̃ , (11)
2 2β
σv
p
+ ζA + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 )
!#
k ñ − √ v
2bn bm j
− Γ̃ , ,
2 2β
∫∞
where Γ̃(a, z) = Γ(a)
1
z
t(a−1) e−t dt denotes the regularized upper incomplete Gamma function,
N and
Θj , and vj are weights, and roots of the Hermite polynomial, respectively, and {an , bn }n=1
M
{am , bm }m=1 are constants used for approximation of an exponential integral function as in [45].
Proof: Please refer Appendix B.
4. Analytical expression for BER

Using the aforementioned derived PDF of the overall additive distortion for imperfect and
outdated CSI scenarios, we proceed to derive an analytical expression of BER for generalized
l=( M −1)
M-ary PAM constellation, i.e. x ∈ {±(2l + 1)A}l=0 2 . Notably, the presented BER analysis
can be readily generalized for multilevel modulations like M-ary carrieless amplitude and phase
quadrature amplitude modulation (M-CAP-QAM) [46].
4.1. BER for imperfect CSI

Theorem 1: The analytical expression of BER for a VLC system under ambient light interference,
LED nonlinearity, and imperfect CSI for M-PAM scheme is given as (denoted by PICSIe )
q
k −A + kβ − ui 2(α + ζ σ∆ + h σv + σ1 )
m1
" 2 2 2 2 2 2 !
1 Õ Θi
ICSI
Pe ≈ 1 − √ γ̃ ,
M i=1 π 2 2β
q (12)
k A + kβ − ui 2(α 2 + ζ 2 σ 2 + h2 σ 2 + σ 2 ) ! #
∆ v 1
+ β Γ̃ , ,
2 2β
∫x
where γ̃(a, z) = Γ(a)
1
0
ta−1 e−t dt is the regularized lower incomplete gamma function, and
q
A = M6E 2 −1 (where Es = h ζ E{x } is the overall energy of signal).
s 2 2 2
Proof: The overall BER for M-PAM scheme can be written as [46]
!
1
ICSI
Pr(ñ< − A) + Pr(ñ>A)

Pe ≈ 1 − (13)
M | {z } | {z }
I1 I2
The integrals I1 , and I2 need to be evaluated separately since the PDF of the overall additive
distortion pICSI
Ñ
(ñ) is asymmetric (as opposed to classical BER analysis over AWGN channels
wherein symmetry of the Gaussian distribution is exploited). Using (9), the integrals I1 , and I2
can be computed as
m1
"∫ !#
Õ Θi 1 −A
ñ + z(ui ) 2k −1 ñ + z(ui )
I1 ≈ Pr(ñ< − A) ≈ √ k exp − dñ, (14)
i=1
π 2 2 Γ( k ) −∞ β 2β
2
m1
"∫ !#
Õ Θi 1 ∞
ñ + z(ui ) 2k −1 ñ + z(ui )
I2 ≈ Pr(ñ>A) ≈ √ k exp − dñ (15)
i=1
π 2 2 Γ( k ) A β 2β
2
q
i)
where z(ui ) = kβ − ui 2(α2 + ζ 2 σ∆2 + h2 σv2 + σ12 ). After substituting t = ñ+z(u2β in (14) and (15),
and using the mathematical definition of lower and upper incomplete gamma function [43], we
get the final expression of BER for imperfect CSI as given in (12).
Corollary of Theorem 1: The analytical expression of BER for a VLC system impaired by
ambient light interference, and LED nonlinearity for perfect CSI scenario (denoted by PPCSI e ) can
be determined by substituting variance of channel estimation error σ∆2 = 0 and σ12 = 0 in (12),
which can be written as
m1
" p ! p !#
1 Õ Θi k −A + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 ) k A + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 )
PCSI
Pe ≈ 1− √ γ̃ , +β Γ̃ ,
M i=1 π 2 2β 2 2β
(16)
4.2. BER for outdated CSI

Theorem 2: The analytical expression of BER for a VLC system impaired by ambient light, LED
nonlinearity, and outdated CSI for M-PAM scheme is given as (denoted by POCSI e )
!( m1 Õm1 Õ
N ÕM
1 1 Õ −1
POCSI
e ≈ 1 − √ 2βΘi Θj an am bm 2 ×
M 2 2πζA i=1 j=1 n=1 m=1
" ! !
k −A − ζA + c(ui , vj ) k −A + ζA + c(ui , vj )
Γ̃1 , − Γ̃1 , +1 (17)
2 2β 2 2β
! !#)
k A − ζA + c(ui , vj ) k A + ζA + c(ui , vj )
− Γ̃1 , + Γ̃1 , ,
2 2β 2 2β
σv
p
where c(ui , vj ) = − √2b v + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 ), and Γ̃1 ( 2k , x) = xΓ̃( 2k , x) − Γ̃( 2k + 1, x).
b j
n m
Proof: The integration of regularized upper incomplete gamma function can be written as [47]
k xΓ( 2k , x) − Γ( 2k + 1, x)
Γ̃1 ( , x) = . (18)
2 Γ( 2k )
Using (18), the overall CDF of ñ (denoted by POCSI

Ñ
(ñ))) for outdated CSI can be written as
m1 Õ
m1 N+1
Õ M+1
1 Õ Õ −1
POCSI
Ñ
(ñ)) ≈ √ 2βΘi Θj an am bm 2
2πζA i=1 j=1 n=1 m=1
" ! !# (19)
k ñ − ζA + c(ui , vj ) k ñ + ζA + ci,j
× Γ̃1 , − Γ̃1 , .
2 2β 2 2β

Hence, using POCSI
e ≈ 1 − M1 Pr(ñ< − A) + Pr(ñ>A) ≈ 1 − M1 [POCSI Ñ
(−A) + 1 − POCSI
Ñ
(A)]
[46], we get the final expression of BER for outdated CSI scenario as given in (17). The presented
BER analysis for M-PAM scheme can be readily generalized for any arbitrary digital modulations
scheme since the integrals involved in computation of BER (I1 , and I2 ) are generic independent
of the modulation schemes.
4.3. BER for DCO-OFDM

In this section, an analytical expression of BER for DCO-OFDM scheme is derived. After
removal of CP and performing FFT at the receiver, the overall channel consists of parallel
flat-fading channels in the frequency domain (i.e., the channel coefficient is channel frequency
response (CFR) over each subcarrier). Hence, analytical expression of BER for multicarrier
DCO-OFDM scheme for imperfect, and outdated CSI can be easily deduced from the BER
expressions derived for single-carrier ones in (12), and (17), respectively. Let us denote BER for
imperfect CSI, and outdated CSI for single carrier by PICSI
e (A(i) , Es(i) ), and POCSI
e (A(i) , Es(i) ). The
overall average BER for multicarrier DCO OFDM scheme for imperfect, and outdated CSI can
be written as
i=K
1 Õ ICSI (i) (i)
PICSI,
e
DCO-OFDM
= P (A , Es ) (20)
K i=1 e
i=K
1 Õ OCSI (i) (i)
POCSI,
e
DCO-OFDM
= P (A , Es ) (21)
K i=1 e
q
6Esi
where K is the total number of subcarriers, A(i) = M2 −1 , where Esi = | H̃(i) | 2 ζ 2 E{| x̂i | 2 } denotes
the signal energy for ith subcarrier.
5. Simulations
In this section, we present computer simulations for validating the presented BER analysis for
outdated/imperfect CSI in the presence of interference due to ambient light, and LED nonlinearity.
Without loss of generality, the number of terms m1 in the Gauss-Hermite approximation is taken
as 30, number of terms N and M in the approximation of an exponential integral function in (30)
is considered as 2, and the modulation is assumed to be 2-PAM/OOK. 105 symbols are considered
over an ensemble of 200 independent Monte-Carlo simulations. Simulation parameters for VLC
channel, and Rapp’s LED nonlinearity are listed in Table 1 [10,36]. In all the plots, single legend
("black circular markers without lines") are used to denote analytical BER.
2
Signal to thermal noise ratio ( αA2 ) vs BER plots are shown in Fig. 2, and Fig. 3 for perfect CSI
for φ 1 = 40◦ , and φ 1 = 60◦ , respectively, for different values of LED nonlinearity parameter p,
2 2
Table 1. Simulation parameters

PARAMETERS SPECIFICATIONS
Dimension of room 5m × 5m × 3m
LED location (2.5 m, 2.5 m, 3 m)
PD location (2 m, 2 m, 1.5 m)
Effective aperture area of detector 1 cm2
Field of view (FOV) 60◦
Transmitter semi-angle 40◦ , 60◦
at half power (φ 1 )
2
Maximum saturation voltage (Vmax ) 0.5 V
Threshold voltage (Vth ) 0.2 V
Knee factor p 1, 2
Modulation scheme OOK
and ambient light parameters {β, k}. It can be observed from Fig. 2 and Fig. 3 that the derived
analytical BER for perfect CSI closely overlaps with the simulated BER plots for various ambient
light parameter values {β, k}. It can be inferred from Fig. 2 and Fig. 3 that the BER performance
degrades with increase in severity of LED nonlinearity parameter (i.e., p = 1 is more severe
than p = 2 [10]), which is intuitive from the fact that the signal power reduces by a factor of ζ 2 ,
and noise power increases by a factor of σv2 due to LED nonlinearity. Furthermore, it can be
observed from Fig. 2 and Fig. 3 that the BER performance degrades with the increase in LED
semi-angle φ 1 which is intuitive from the fact that channel gain h decreases with the increase in
2
LED semi-angle φ 1 , thereby reducing the overall SNR at the receiver.
2
Fig. 2. BER performance for perfect CSI with φ 1 = 40◦ , p = 2, k = 1 (left), and p = 1,
2
k = 3 (right). (S) denotes the simulated BER.
2
Next, signal to thermal noise ratio ( αA2 ) vs BER plots are shown in Fig. 4, and Fig. 5 for
imperfect CSI for φ 1 = 40◦ , and φ 1 = 60◦ , respectively, for different values of LED nonlinearity
2 2
parameter p, and ambient light parameters {β, k}. It can be observed from Fig. 3, and Fig. 4
that the derived approximate expression for BER well-agrees with the simulated BER plots
for various parameter values {σ∆2 , β} for imperfect CSI, which establishes the accuracy of the
Fig. 3. BER performance for perfect CSI with φ 1 = 60◦ , p = 2, k = 1 (left), and p = 1,
2
presented analysis. Furthermore, it can be observed from Fig. 4 (left) and Fig. 5 (left) that the
BER increases with the increase in channel estimation error σ∆2 , and ambient light parameter β,
which is intuitive. However, it can be observed from Fig. 4 (right), and Fig. 5 (right) that the
BER performance improves with the increase in channel estimation error σ∆2 , which is counter
intuitive. This can be explained from the fact that the BER plot with the highest σ∆2 is also the
plot with the lowest β (i.e. the BER is majorly controlled by ambient light parameter β in this
scenario).
Fig. 4. BER performance for imperfect CSI with φ 1 = 40◦ , p = 2, k = 1 (left), and p = 1,
2
2
Next, signal to thermal noise ratio ( αA2 ) vs BER plots are shown in Fig. 6, and Fig. 7 for outdated
CSI for φ 1 = 40◦ , and φ 1 = 60◦ , respectively, for different simulation parameters {p, , β, k}. It
2 2
can be observed from Fig. 5, and Fig. 6 that the analytical BER plots closely overlaps with the
simulated BER plots for various parameter values {, β} for outdated CSI, which justifies the
derived BER expression for outdated CSI. Furthermore, it can be observed from Fig. 6 (left) and
Fig. 5. BER performance for imperfect CSI with φ 1 = 60◦ , p = 2, k = 1 (left), and p = 1,
2
Fig. 7 (left) that the BER performance degrades with the increase in parameter values {, β},
which is intuitive. However, similar to imperfect CSI scenario, some counter intuitive artifacts
can be observed from Fig. 6 (right), and Fig. 7 (right) for outdated CSI that the BER decreases
with the increase in outdated CSI parameter . This can be justified from the fact that the BER
plot with the highest is also the plot with the lowest β (i.e. the BER is majorly controlled by
ambient light parameter β in this scenario). It is noteworthy that, in this case, we consider a
low data rate scenario (of the order of few tens of MHz) for OOK wherein the effects of finite
modulation bandwidth are negligible.
Fig. 6. BER performance for outdated CSI with φ 1 = 40◦ , p = 2, k = 1 (left), and p = 1,
2
However, in the high data-rate regime, the effects of the Lorentzian transfer function are
more pronounced. For achieving high data rates, the performance of DCO-OFDM in these
scenarios is a viable solution. Therefore, to corroborate the analytical results obtained in (20)
and (21), simulations studies are presented next for DCO-OFDM over VLC channels impaired by
Fig. 7. BER performance for outdated CSI with φ 1 = 60◦ , p = 2, k = 1 (left), and p = 1,
2
ambient interference, LED nonlinearity, and imperfect/outdated CSI. Simulation parameters for
DCO-OFDM are chosen as follows: Number of data subcarriers K = 720, FFT size of 1024,
number of symbols per OFDM frame are chosen as 200, total number of frames are chosen
as 50, and cyclic prefix of length 64 (FFT size/16) is chosen. Signal to thermal noise ratio
2
( αA2 ) vs BER performance for DCO-OFDM scheme are shown in Fig. 8 for imperfect CSI and
outdated CSI scenarios. It can be observed from Fig. 8 that BER degrades with the increase in
ambient light parameter β, and channel estimation error (σ∆2 for imperfect CSI, and for outdated
CSI). Furthermore, it can also be inferred from Fig. 8 that the simulated BER matches with the
corresponding analytical BER, which validates the accuracy of the derived expressions for BER
for DCO-OFDM scheme. For K = 720, M = 2 (for OOK), and Ts = 1µs, the achieved data rate
for VLC systems using DCO-OFDM scheme is 360 Mbps.
Fig. 8. SNR vs BER performance for DCO-OFDM for imperfect (left), and outdated CSI
(right) with φ 1 = 40◦ , p = 1, and k = 1.
2
Lastly, BER performance for the considered impaired VLC link is monitored by varying the
transmit data rate. Data rate vs BER plots are shown in Fig. 9 at an SNR of 30 dB for imperfect,
and outdated CSI for different values of ambient light parameter β, and σ∆2 (for imperfect CSI),
and (for outdated CSI). It can be observed from Fig. 9 that a date rate of 1.08 Gbps is achieved
using DCO-OFDM scheme with BER of approx 10−4 for lower ambient light variance β = 0.015.
As inferred from Fig. 9, data rate and BER degrades with the increase in ambient light variance.
Fig. 9. Data rate vs BER performance for DCO-OFDM for imperfect (left), and outdated
CSI (right) with φ 1 = 40◦ , p = 1, and k = 1.
2
6. Conclusion
In this paper, an analytical expression for BER is quantified for a VLC system in the presence
of ambient light interference, LED nonlinearity, and imperfect/outdated CSI. The derived
expressions for BER are validated through computer simulations performed over practical VLC
channels, which indicate that the analytical BER closely overlaps with the simulated BER, which
ratifies the presented analysis, and makes the proposed analysis viable for practical VLC system
design.
Appendix A: proof of proposition 1

From (5), the PDF of ñ is a convolution of scaled and shifted chi-squared distribution with k
degrees of freedom, and a zero mean Gaussian distribution with variance α2 + ζ 2 σ∆2 + h2 σv2 + σ12 .
Hence, the PDF of ñ (denoted by pICSI
Ñ
(ñ)) for imperfect CSI can be written as
!
1
∫ ∞ ñ + kβ − x x2
pICSI (ñ) = q p exp − dx.
Ñ β 2(α2 + ζ 2 σ∆2 + h2 σv2 + σ12 )
2π(α2 + ζ 2 σ∆2 + h2 σv2 + σ12 ) −∞
(22)
After substituting t = √ x
, the integral in (23) reduces to
2(α2 +ζ 2 σ∆2 +h2 σv2 +σ12 )
q
ñ + kβ − t 2(α2 + ζ 2 σ∆2 + h2 σv2 + σ12 )
!
∫ ∞
1
pICSI (ñ) = √ p exp(−t2 )dt. (23)
Ñ π −∞ β
∫∞ 2
Using Gauss-Hermite rule −∞ f (x)e−x = m
Í 1
i=1 Θ1 f (ui ) [47], the above integral in (23) can be
solved, and we get the final expression for PDF under imperfect CSI as given in (9).
Appendix B: proof of proposition 2

For outdated CSI, we can write (5) as: ñ = ψ1 + ζ∆x + ∆v. Hence, PDF of the overall
additive distortion ñ for outdated CSI is the convolution of following three components: (a)
∆1 = ζ∆x ∈ U(−ζA, ζA), which is a uniform random variable, (b) ψ1 = hv + αn + β(w − k),
which is the sum of Gaussian random variable N (0, α2 + h2 σv2 ), and scaled and shifted chi-square
distribution, and (c) ∆v, which is the product of uniform and Gaussian random variable. From
(9), the PDF of ψ1 (denoted by p1 (ψ1 )) can be written as:
m1 p !
1 Õ ψ1 + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 )
p1 (ψ1 ) ≈ √ Θi p . (24)
π i=1 β
Hence, the PDF of ψ2 = ψ1 + ∆1 , denoted by p2 (ψ2 ) can be written as
∫ ζA
1
p(ψ2 ) = p2 (ψ2 − ∆1 )d∆1 . (25)
2ζA −ζA
After solving the above integral, (25) reduces to
m1
" p !
1 Õ Θi k ψ2 − ζA + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 )
p2 (ψ2 ) ≈ √ Γ̃ ,
2ζA i=1 π 2 2β
p !# (26)
k ψ2 + ζA + kβ − ui 2(α2 + h2 σv2 )
− Γ̃ , .
2 2β
Next, the overall PDF of the product distribution z = ∆v, denoted as g(z) (i.e., the product of
uniform and Gaussian random variable) can be written as [48]
∫ !
1 1 ( ∆z )2
g(z) = p exp − d∆. (27)
2 2πσv2 − |∆| 2σv2
After substituting t = 2σ z2 −2 , and using a f (x)dx = 2 a f (x)dx for even function f (x), (27)
∫ ∫
2∆ −a 0
v
reduces to !
∫ ∞
1 1 z2
g(z) = p t e dt = p
−1 −t
E1 , (28)
2
2 2πσv2 2 z2 σ 2 2 2πσv2 2 2 σv2
v
∫ ∞ −t
where E1 (x) = x et dt denotes the exponential integral function. Therefore, the PDF of the
overall additive distortion ñ = ψ2 + z (denoted by pOCSI Ñ
(ñ)) can be written as convolution of
p2 (ψ2 ) and g(z) as ∫ ∞
pOCSI
Ñ
(ñ) = p2 (ñ − τ)g(τ)dτ. (29)
−∞
From [45, eq. (7)], an exponential integral function can be approximated using a sum of
exponentials as
√ Õ N Õ M p
E1 (x) ≈ 4 2π an am bn e−4bn bm x , (30)
n=1 m=1
where N
{an , bn }n=1
and M
{am , bm }m=1 are constants as given in [45]. Using (30), the integral in (29)
can be written as
N Õ
M
!
1 √ Õ p ∫ ∞
2bn bm 2
pOCSI (ñ) ≈ 4 2π an am bn × p2 (ñ − τ) exp − 2 2 τ dτ. (31)
Ñ σv
p
2 2πσv2 n=1 m=1 −∞
√
After substituting t = 2b n bm
σv τ in (31), and using Gauss-Hermite integration rule, we get the final
expression for pOCSI
Ñ
(ñ) as given in (11).
Acknowledgement
This publication is an outcome of the R&D work undertaken project under the Visvesvaraya
PhD Scheme of Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology, Government of India, being
implemented by Digital India Corporation.
Disclosures
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
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Research Article Vol. 3, No.

11 / 15 November 2020 / OSA Continuum 3125

On BER analysis of nonlinear VLC systems

Abstract: Visible light communication (VLC) has emerged as a promising supplement to

2.1. System model for VLC for single carrier scheme

LED is modeled by Rapp’s model as follows [10,37]:

y = (h + ∆)f (x) + αn + β(w − k), (3)

y = hζx + ∆v + ζ∆x + hv + αn + β(w − k), (4)

ñ = ∆v + ζ∆x + hv + αn + β(w − k). (5)

2.2. System model for multiple carrier DCO-OFDM scheme

x = [x0 x1 . . . x K −1 x K x∗K −1 . . . x1∗ ]

ỹ = (h̃ + δ) ∗ f (x̃) + αn + β(w − k) (7)

y = H̃ζ x̂ + ∆v + ζ∆x̂ + H̃v + αñ + β(w̃ − k̃) (8)

3. Analytical expressions for PDF of additive distortion

3.1. PDF under imperfect CSI

3.2. PDF under outdated CSI

4. Analytical expression for BER

4.1. BER for imperfect CSI

4.2. BER for outdated CSI

Using (18), the overall CDF of ñ (denoted by POCSI

4.3. BER for DCO-OFDM

Table 1. Simulation parameters

Appendix A: proof of proposition 1

Appendix B: proof of proposition 2

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