This thesis describes work on the theoretical modelling and experimental measurement of the complex permittivity of dielectrics. The main focus of research has been into the characterisation of permittivity of planar and layered samples within the millimetre wave band. The measurement method is based on the free-space measurement of the transmission and reflection coefficients of samples. A novel analytical method of determining the transmission and reflection coefficients as functions of frequency arising from a generalised structure of planar dielectric layers is also described and validated. The analytical method is based on signal flow techniques. The measurement and analytical techniques have been applied in two main areas: firstly, the acquisition of new data on human skin in the band 57 to 100GHz and secondly, the detection and location of defects in composite materials for which a band of 90 to 100GHz was used. Measurements have been made on the complex permittivity of a single sample of excised human skin fixed in formaldehyde. The experimental results have been corrected to account for the fixing process in formaldehyde and are projected to body temperature. This data is, to the best of the author’s knowledge, the first of its kind to be published. Predicted skin permittivity based on various relaxation models varies widely and only partially fits the measured data. The experimental results have been used to determine the parameters of a Cole-Cole function which gives the best fit to the measured data. The measured skin data has also been used to calculate power deposition in skin exposed to millimetre wave radiation. This work concludes that a skin surface temperature rise of only 0.20C results from a thirty second exposure to signals of 100W/m2. Experimental work with fibreglass composite samples has shown that defects such as delaminations, voids, matrix cracks and improper cure result in resolvable differences in the dielectric properties of the samples at 90 – 100GHz. The measurement technique is particularly sensitive to the detection of cracks and its spatial resolution is 20mm or better. Whilst confirming the general conclusions of previously published work, the specific findings of this study are novel.

We experimentally demonstrate an eight-state continuous-variable quantum key distribution (CV-QKD) over atmospheric turbulence channels. The high secret key rate (SKR) is enabled by 4-D multiplexing of 96 channels, i.e., six-channel wavelength-division multiplexing, four-channel orbital angular momentum multiplexing, two-channel polarization multiplexing, and two-channel spatial-position multiplexing. The atmospheric turbulence channel is emulated by a spatial light modulator on which a series of azimuthal phase patterns yielding Andrews' spectrum are recorded. A commercial coherent receiver is implemented at Bob's side, followed by a phase noise cancellation stage, where channel transmittance can be monitored accurately and phase noise can be effectively eliminated. Compared to four-state CV-QKD, eight-state CV-QKD protocol potentially provides a better performance by offering higher SKR, better excess noise tolerance, and longer secure transmission distance. In our proposed CV-QKD system, the minimum transmittances of 0.24 and 0.26 are required for OAM states of 2 (or -2) and 6 (or -6), respectively, to guarantee the secure transmission. A maximum SKR of 3.744 Gb/s is experimentally achievable, while a total SKR of 960 Mb/s can be obtained in case of mean channel transmittances.

When using quantum key distribution (QKD), one of the trade-offs for security is that the generation rate of a secret key is typically very low. Recent works have shown that using a weak coherent source allows for higher secret key generation rates compared to an entangled photon source, when a channel with low loss is considered. In most cases, the system that is being studied is over a fiber-optic communication channel. Here a theoretical QKD system using the BB92 protocol and entangled photons over a free-space maritime channel with multiple spatial modes is presented. The entangled photons are generated from a spontaneous parametric down conversion (SPDC) source of type II. To employ multiple spatial modes, the transmit apparatus will contain multiple SPDC sources, all driven by the pump lasers assumed to have the same intensity. The receive apparatuses will contain avalanche photo diodes (APD), modeled based on the NuCrypt CPDS-1000 detector, and located at the focal point of the receive aperture lens. The transmitter is assumed to be located at Alice and Bob will be located 30 km away, implying no channel crosstalk will be introduced in the measurements at Alices side due to turbulence. To help mitigate the effects of atmospheric turbulence, adaptive optics will be considered at the transmitter and the receiver. An eavesdropper, Eve, is located 15 km from Alice and has no control over the devices at Alice or Bob. Eve is performing the intercept resend attack and listening to the communication over the public channel. Additionally, it is assumed that Eve can correct any aberrations caused by the atmospheric turbulence to determine which source the photon was transmitted from. One, four and nine spatial modes are considered with and without applying adaptive optics and compared to one another.

Este trabalho versa sobre a verticalização em São Paulo e seus impactos sobre a qualidade ambiental dos espaços livres. Parte-se do pressuposto de que a não compreensão, por parte do corpo técnico e da população em geral, dos problemas resultantes da verticalização (tais como: sombreamentos, canalização de ventos, alteração da umidade do ar, maior aquecimento e agravamento da poluição) piora a qualidade ambiental dos espaços livres. No corpo do trabalho são introduzidos os procedimentos básicos para o aprimoramento da qualidade ambiental, que devem ser conhecidos e aplicados normalmente no projeto dos espaços livres. Os espaços livres públicos, como as vias, praças e parques, assim como os espaços privados, que são os espaços livres existentes nos lotes, em torno das edificações; têm perdido sua habitabilidade em conseqüência da verticalização e do adensamento urbano, mesmo com a aplicação da atual legislação de uso e ocupação do solo. Implantada em 1972, ela gera espaços livres mais generosos do que anteriormente, com a obrigatoriedade de novos recuos e menores taxas de ocupação. Esta legislação ao determinar espaços livres um pouco maiores, cria condições para que os incorporadores agreguem, aos seus empreendimentos, equipamentos para o lazer, mesmo que essas áreas sejam ambientalmente inadequadas. A qualidade ambiental resultante é analisada sob o aspecto perceptivo-sensorial, considerando-se a influência que o Meio Urbano Verticalizado (malha viária, espaços livres, quadras, lotes e edificações) tem sobre as variáveis ambientais do Meio Natural (radiação solar, ar, água, solo, vegetação e fauna). As variáveis ambientais são analisadas em cinco regiões com bairros densamente verticalizados: a) Centro: Higienópolis; b) Norte: Freguesia do Ó; c) Sul: Moema; d) Leste: Vila Gomes Cardim; e) Oeste: Perdizes. Como resultado, são apresentadas recomendações, implementáveis no processo de projeto, para melhorar a qualidade ambiental nos espaços livres urbanos de áreas verticalizadas. / This thesis turns on the verticalization in São Paulo and its impacts on the environmental quality of free spaces. It breaks of the presupposition that the nonunderstanding, on the part of the technical body and of the population in general, of the resulting problems of the verticalization (such as shadows, canalization of winds, alteration of the humidity of the air, larger heating and worsening of the pollution) worsens the environmental quality of free spaces. In the body of the work the basic procedures are introduced to increase the environmental quality that should be known and usually applied in the project of such spaces. The public free spaces, as roads, squares and parks; as well as the private spaces, that are the existent free spaces in the lots, around the constructions; they have been losing its inhabitability in consequence of the verticalization and the increase of the urban areas, even with the application of the current legislation on use and occupation of the soil. Implanted in 1972, it generates more generous free spaces than previously, with the obligation of new recoils and smaller occupation rates. This legislation when establishing free spaces a little larger, it creates conditions so that the incorporators joins, to its enterprises, equipments for leisure, even if those areas are functionally inadequate for such, even if they never receive sun light or that make funnel-shaped and accelerate the winds. The resulting environmental quality is analyzed under the perceptive-sensorial aspect, considering the influence that the Verticalized Urban Way (its street ensemble, free spaces, blocks, lots and constructions) has on the environmental variables of the Natural Way (solar radiation, air, water, soil, vegetation and fauna). The analysis are applied to five areas with neighborhoods densely verticalized: a) Center: Higienópolis; b) North: Freguesia do Ó; c) South: Moema; d) East: Vila Gomes Cardim; e) West: Perdizes. As result, recommendations presented, to be used in the project process, to improve the environmental quality in the urban free spaces of verticalized areas.

The exponential increase of mobile users and the demand for high-speed data services has resulted in significant congestions in cellular backhaul capacity. As a solution to satisfy the traffic requirements of the existing 4G network, the 5G network has emerged as an enabling technology and a fundamental building block of next-generation communication networks. An essential requirement in 5G backhaul networks is their unparalleled capacity to handle heavy traffic between a large number of devices and the core network. Microwave and optic fiber technologies have been considered as feasible solutions for next-generation backhaul networks. However, such technologies are not cost effective to deploy, especially for the backhaul in high-density urban or rugged areas, such as those surrounded by mountains and solid rocks. Additionally, microwave technology faces alarmingly challenging issues, including limited data rates, scarcity of licensed spectrum, advanced interference management, and rough weather conditions (i.e., rain, which is the main weather condition that affects microwave signals the most). The focus of this work is to investigate the feasibility of using free-space-optical (FSO) technology in the 5G cellular backhaul network. FSO is a cost-effective and wide-bandwidth solution as compared to traditional backhaul solutions. However, FSO links are sensitive to atmospheric turbulence-induced fading, path loss, and pointing errors. Increasing the reliability of FSO systems while still exploiting their high data rate communications is a key requirement in the deployment of an FSO backhaul network. Overall, the theoretical models proposed in this work will be shown to enhance FSO link performance. In the experimental direction, we begin by designing an integrated mobile FSO system. To the best of our knowledge, no work in the literature has addressed the atmospheric path loss characterization of mobile FSO channels in a coastal environment. Therefore, we investigate the impact of weather effects in Thuwal, Saudi Arabia, over FSO links using outdoor and indoor setups. For the indoor experiments, results are reported based on a glass climate chamber in which we could precisely control the temperature and humidity.

Free-space optics (FSO) is an unlicensed communication technology that uses the free space as a propagation medium to connect two communicating terminal wire- lessly [1]. It is an attractive solution to the last-mile connectivity problems in commu- nication networks, mainly when installing optical fibers is expensive or unavailable. A possible idea to increase the throughput of wireless optical links in free space is to use spatial multiplexing (SMM) [2]. Optical beam distortion due to propagation through a turbulent channel is one of the main factors limiting performance of such a system. Therefore, overcoming the effect of turbulence is a major problem for structured light optical communication in free space. Usually, this problem is approached by using adaptive optics systems and various methods of digital signal processing (DSP) on the receiver side [3–5]. Recently, an idea of optical channel pre-compensation to mit- igate inter-modal crosstalk was proposed [6] and experimentally validated [7]. Such a method, if implemented, will allow the use of entirely passive receivers or, in the case of full-duplex transmission, increase throughput. Here, the performance of a zero-forcing precoding technique to mitigate the effects of an optical turbulence in a Laguerre Gaussian mode based SMM FSO is investigated. Equally, details on a close to reality simulation of the atmospheric turbulence and beam propagation are provided.

The exponential increase in the number of mobile users, coupled with the strong demand for high-speed data services results in a significant growth in the required cellular backhaul capacity. Optimizing the cost efficiency while increasing the capacity is becoming a key challenge to the cellular backhaul. It refers to connections between base stations and mobile switching nodes over a variety of transport technologies such as copper, optical fibers, and radio links. These traditional transmission technologies are either expensive, or cannot provide high data rates. This work is focused on the opportunities of free-space-optical (FSO) technology in next generation cellular back- haul. FSO is a cost effective and wide bandwidth solution as compared with the traditional radio-frequency (RF) transmission. Moreover, due to its ease of deployment, license-free operation, high transmission security, and insensitivity to interference, FSO links are becoming an attractive solution for next generation cellular networks. However, the widespread deployment of FSO links is hampered by the atmospheric turbulence-induced fading, weather conditions, and pointing errors. Increasing the reliability of FSO systems, while still exploiting their high data rate communications, is a key requirement in the deployment of an FSO-based backhaul. Therefore, the aim of this work is to provide different approaches to address these technical challenges. In this context, investigation of hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) protocols from an information-theoretic perspective is undertaken. Moreover, performance analysis of asymmetric RF/FSO dual-hop systems is studied. In such system models, multiple RF users can be multiplexed and sent over the FSO link. More specifically, the end-to-end performance metrics are presented in closed-form. This also has increased the interest to study the performance of dual-hop mixed FSO/RF systems, where the FSO link is used as a multicast channel that serves different RF users. Having such interesting results motivates further the analysis of dual-hop FSO fixed-gain relaying communication systems, and exact closed-form performance metrics are presented in terms of the bivariate H-Fox function. This model is further enhanced through the deployment of a multihop FSO relaying system as an efficient technique to mitigate the turbulence-induced fading as well as pointing errors.

The Master's thesis deals with the determination of measurement method of deflection the axis of the optical beam from its ideal position, which is caused by action of force of strong winds affecting the positional stability of the building or supporting structure (tower) used for placement of FSO links'heads. The thesis informs the readers about the other causes of deflection of beam axis in a real environment, about methods of determining the position of the beam axis in the plane perpendicular to the beam axis and the basic properties and parameters of the Gauss beams, including the phenomenon of diffraction on the output aperture of the laser transmitter.

Tato práce se zabývá problematikou optických bezkabelových spojů (FSO). V úvodní kapitole jsou diskutovány přednosti, základní principy a dílčí komponenty FSO spojů. Druhá kapitola se zabývá atmosférou z pohledu šířícího se optického svazku, jejím složením, základními veličinami a jevy v ní nastávajícími. V následující kapitole je popsáno několik metod ke zmírnění jevů majících negativní vliv na kvalitu spoje. Druhá část práce se zabývá návrhem podpůrného systému pro FSO, založeném na softcore mikroprocesoru MicroBlaze, návrhem jednoduchého síťového přepínače a síťového rozhraní. Závěr práce pojednává o implementaci webového serveru a tvorbě webové prezentace umožňující vzdálenou správu FSO a jeho komponent.

Generalized fading has been an imminent part and parcel of wireless communications. It not only characterizes the wireless channel appropriately but also allows its utilization for further performance analysis of various types of wireless communication systems. Under the umbrella of generalized fading channels, a unified performance analysis of a free-space optical (FSO) link over the Malaga (M) atmospheric turbulence channel that accounts for pointing errors and both types of detection techniques (i.e. indirect modulation/direct detection (IM/DD) as well as heterodyne detection) is presented. Specifically, unified exact closed-form expressions for the probability density function (PDF), the cumulative distribution function (CDF), the moment generating function (MGF), and the moments of the end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of a single link FSO transmission system are presented, all in terms of the Meijer's G function except for the moments that is in terms of simple elementary functions. Then capitalizing on these unified results, unified exact closed-form expressions for various performance metrics of FSO link transmission systems are offered, such as, the outage probability (OP), the higher-order amount of fading (AF), the average error rate for binary and M-ary modulation schemes, and the ergodic capacity (except for IM/DD technique, where closed-form lower bound results are presented), all in terms of Meijer's G functions except for the higher-order AF that is in terms of simple elementary functions. Additionally, the asymptotic results are derived for all the expressions derived earlier in terms of the Meijer's G function in the high SNR regime in terms of simple elementary functions via an asymptotic expansion of the Meijer's G function. Furthermore, new asymptotic expressions for the ergodic capacity in the low as well as high SNR regimes are derived in terms of simple elementary functions via utilizing moments. All the presented results are verified via computer-based Monte-Carlo simulations. Besides addressing the pointing errors with zero boresight effects as has been addressed above, a unified capacity analysis of a FSO link that accounts for nonzero boresight pointing errors and both types of detection techniques (i.e. heterodyne detection as well as IM/DD) is also addressed. Specifically, an exact closed-form expression for the moments of the end-to-end SNR of a single link FSO transmission system is presented in terms of well-known elementary functions. Capitalizing on these new moments expressions, approximate and simple closed-form results for the ergodic capacity at high and low SNR regimes are derived for lognormal (LN), Rician-LN (RLN), and M atmospheric turbulences. All the presented results are verified via computer-based Monte-Carlo simulations. Based on the fact that FSO links are cost-effective, license-free, and can provide even higher bandwidths compared to the traditional radio-frequency (RF) links, the performance analysis of a dual-hop relay system composed of asymmetric RF and FSO links is presented. This is complemented by the performance analysis of a dual-branch transmission system composed of a direct RF link and a dual-hop relay composed of asymmetric RF and FSO links. The performance of the later scenario is evaluated under the assumption of the selection combining (SC) diversity and the maximal ratio combining (MRC) schemes. RF links are modeled by Rayleigh fading distribution whereas the FSO link is modeled by a unified GG fading distribution. More specifically, in this work, new exact closed-form expressions for the PDF, the CDF, the MGF, and the moments of the end-to-end SNR are derived. Capitalizing on these results, new exact closed-form expressions for the OP, the higher-order AF, the average error rate for binary and M-ary modulation schemes, and the ergodic capacity are offered. Cognitive radio networks (CRN) have also proved to improve the performance of wireless communication systems and hence based on this, the hybrid system analyzed above is extended with CRN technology wherein the outage and error performance analysis of a dual-hop transmission system composed of asymmetric RF channel cascaded with a FSO link is presented. For the RF link, an underlay cognitive network is considered where the secondary users share the spectrum with licensed primary users. Indoor femtocells act as a practical example for such networks. Specifically, it is assumed that the RF link applies power control to maintain the interference at the primary network below a predetermined threshold. While the RF channel is modeled by the Rayleigh fading distribution, the FSO link is modeled by a unified Gamma-Gamma turbulence distribution. The FSO link accounts for pointing errors and both types of detection techniques (i.e. heterodyne detection as well as IM/DD). With this model, a new exact closed-form expression is derived for the OP and the error rate of the end-to-end SNR of these systems in terms of the Meijer's G function and the Fox's H functions under amplify-and-forward relay schemes. All new analytical results are verified via computer-based Monte-Carlo simulations and are illustrated by some selected numerical results.