OFDM-Based Underwater Visible Light Communication

Underwater visible light communication (UVLC) offers a high-speed and low-latency alternative to traditional underwater data transmission methods such as acoustic and radio frequency systems, which face inherent limitations in aquatic environments. This latter presents the design and implementation of an orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM)-based UVLC system using multi-order quadrature amplitude modulation (M-QAM) with a focus on reliable performance in real-world conditions. Experiments were conducted in three water conditions—clear, murky, and dynamically turbid water—using a 545 nm LED. The results show that 64-QAM provides stable performance across all conditions, while higher-order schemes, such as 128-QAM and 256-QAM offer increased data rates but suffer from higher bit error rate under turbidity. The study demonstrates that proposed system can maintain short-range high-throughput communication in variable underwater environments.