Channel characterization of a last-mile access radio over combined fibre and free-space optics system

In this paper, we characterize a radio over fibre and radio over free space optic system for the last mile access network in urban areas and as a solution to the cellular backhaul networks. Special focus is put on the performance of such systems under the atmospheric turbulence. We show that the proposed system performance is almost the same for the entire frequency range of 0.4-4 GHz under the weak or no turbulence regimes. Finally we show that for proposed system with BPSK and QPSK at different RF carrier frequencies the turbulence effect has marginal impact.