EVM and Achievable Data Rate Analysis of Clipped OFDM Signals in Visible Light Communication

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) has been considered for Visible Light Communication (VLC); thanks to its ability to boost data rates as well as its robustness against frequency-selective fading channels. A major disadvantage of OFDM is the large dynamic range of its time-domain waveforms, making OFDM vulnerable to nonlinearity of light emitting diodes. DC-biased Optical OFDM (DCO-OFDM) and Asymmetrically Clipped Optical OFDM (ACO-OFDM) are two popular OFDM techniques developed for the VLC. In this paper, the authors will analyze the performance of the DCO-OFDM and ACO-OFDM signals in terms of Error Vector Magnitude (EVM), Signal-to-Distortion Ratio (SDR), and achievable data rates under both average optical power and dynamic optical power constraints.