Radio-over-Fiber System Using Photonic Active Integrated Antennas (PhAIAs)

Abstract

There is much current interest in low-cost radio-over-fibre (RoF) systems for distribution of mobile-phone and WiFi signals within buildings. In such systems the link gain and packaging cost will be critical. This report describes a low cost scheme for implementing in-building distributed antenna systems using the Photonic Active Integrated Antenna (PhAIA) concept, whereby photonic devices are integrated directly with planar antennas. It is an extension to Active-Integrated-Antenna (AIA) concept from microwave engineering field. The fact that the photonic device and antenna are highly integrated means that very efficient impedance matching can be achieved, which can lead to improved link gain. It could also lead to much reduce packaging and fabrication costs. Keywords: Radio-over-Fiber, Vertical Cavity Surface Emitting Lasers (VCSELs), Photodiodes, Photonic Antenna, WLAN.