Large-capacity long-distance photonics-aided terahertz wireless communication system: key techniques and experimental demonstration
摘要
Terahertz (THz) photonics technology promotes seamless integration with high-speed fiber networks and is expected to become a promising application area for future 6G broadband communication. Optical fiber communication enables ultra-large transmission capacity and ultra-long transmission distance, while wireless communication is characterized by flexibility and wide coverage. To match the demand for large bandwidth, wide coverage and high mobility in future 6G communication networks, realizing the development of large-capacity and long-distance photonics-aided THz communication has become extremely urgent. We propose fiber-THz-fiber seamless integration architecture and low-loss photonic up/down-conversion techniques for THz generation and reception to realize indoor and outdoor continuous coverage of ultra-wideband (UWB) THz signals in future 6G communication networks. Large-capacity photonics-aided THz signals can be generated by utilizing multi-dimensional multiplexing techniques in optical domain and THz domain. In virtue of constellation shaping and coding modulation scheme for multi-dimensional modulation formats, large-capacity fiber-THz wireless integrated transmission can approach the Shannon limit of the channel. In the fiber-THz hybrid channel transmission, nonlinear distortion and crosstalk between multi-dimensional multiplexed signals can be suppressed or eliminated through nonlinear compensation and multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) equalization algorithms, respectively. Furthermore, high gain THz lenses and amplifiers can increase the transmitted power, and multi-antenna diversity technology can improve the SNR of received signals, thereby effectively enhancing the coverage range of photonics-aided THz communication. Based on the above key techniques, we have achieved a series of transmission records: 1-Tbit/s fiber-THz-fiber real-time transmission at 110–500 GHz band, 1-Tbit/s fiber-THz off-line transmission at 330–500 GHz band, 200-m/253-Gbit/s photonics-aided THz wireless transmission and 850-m/104-Gbit/s photonics-aided THz wireless transmission. Finally, this paper introduces the future prospects in key techniques for the larger-capacity, longer-distance photonics-aided THz wireless communication.