Mobile optical communication using a fiber-optic drone

Abstract

Fiber-optic drones use physical fiber-optic tethers for data communication, reducing reliance on wireless radio links. Here, drones combine fiber-based flight-control and uplink paths and visible light downlink to achieve flight control and air-to-ground mobile optical communication at the same time. Optical path alignment is dynamically maintained by integrating with three-axis gimbal modules. Real-time data transmission verifies the end-to-end relay path. An uncoded bit error rate (BER) on the order of 10 −4 is obtained at a received optical power of −30 dBm. The results provide a compact mobile optical relay architecture for radio-frequency (RF)-constrained environments.