Channel modeling for underwater optical communication

TLDR

The paper models underwater optical channels, focusing on the impulse response and time dispersion under varying water types, link distances, and transmitter/receiver parameters. The authors employ a Monte Carlo simulation to trace photon trajectories through water toward the receiver. They find that time dispersion is negligible in most practical scenarios, eliminating inter‑symbol interference, and the results can inform the selection of system design parameters.

Abstract

We consider in this paper channel modeling for underwater optical channels. In particular, we focus on the channel impulse response and quantify the channel time dispersion under different conditions of water type, link distance, and transmitter/receiver parameters. We use the Monte Carlo approach to simulate the trajectories of emitted photons propagating in water towards the receiver. We show that in most practical cases, the time dispersion is negligible and does not induce any inter-symbol interference on the received symbols. Our results can be used to appropriately set different system design parameters.