Design and Optimization of a Hybrid VLC/THz Infrastructure-to-Vehicle Communication System for Intelligent Transportation

TL;DR

This paper introduces a hybrid VLC/THz communication system leveraging existing LED streetlights to provide high-speed, reliable connectivity for intelligent transportation, significantly improving coverage and robustness under challenging conditions.

Contribution

It presents a novel integrated VLC/THz infrastructure with a switching mechanism and layout optimization, enhancing communication coverage and reliability for future ITS.

Findings

Lighting coverage improved from 35% to 97%.

Hybrid communication coverage increased from 49% to 99.9%.

System maintains up to 99% coverage under extreme conditions.

Abstract

This paper proposes a hybrid infrastructure-to-vehicle (I2V) communication framework to support future 6G-enabled intelligent transportation systems (ITS) in smart cities. Leveraging existing LED streetlighting infrastructure, the system simultaneously delivers energy-efficient illumination and high-speed wireless connectivity. The proposed scheme integrates visible light communication (VLC) with a complementary ter-ahertz (THz) antenna array to overcome VLC limitations under high ambient light and adverse weather conditions. Key con-tributions include the design of a VLC/THz access network, seamless integration with lighting infrastructure, a proposed switching-combination (PSC) mechanism, and a physical layout optimization strategy. Using a grid search method, thousands of configurations were evaluated to maximize lighting coverage, re-ceived power, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), signal-to-interference-and-noise ratio (SINR), and minimize outage probability. Results show that optimized lighting coverage improves from 35% to 97%, while hybrid communication coverage increases from 49%to 99.9% at the same power level. Under extreme environmental conditions, the hybrid system maintains up to 99% coverage, compared to 69% with VLC alone. These results demonstrate the scalability, cost-efficiency, and practicality of the proposed system for next-generation ITS deployment.