System and method for data communication over power lines

• US 20060146866A1
• Filed: 10/11/2005
• Published: 07/06/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 04/08/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: ACN Advanced Communications Network SA
• Original Assignee: ACN Advanced Communications Network SA
• Inventors: Jamin, Antony, Horvath, Stephan
• Granted Patent: US 7,986,711 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/464
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 2203/5416 by adding signals to the wave form of the power source
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 3/54 Systems for transmission via power distribution lines
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 5/06 the signals being represented by different frequencies combined with time-division multiplexing H04L5/26

Abstract

A system and a method are proposed for broadband communications over power lines comprising the area of the low-voltage transformer to the house connection unit and/or the electricity distribution inside the house. The new method allows for several parallel asynchronous data communications in different sub-channels with individual transmit power in each sub-channel. Sub-channel separation uses pass-band filters with high stop-band attenuation. High data rate in each sub-channel is achieved through the use of discrete wavelet multi-tone modulation. Coarse synchronization in each sub-channel and the optimization of the coefficients of the time-domain equalizer are carried out using a training sequence.

Claims

1. Method for data communication from a plurality of senders to a plurality of receivers being connected over a single electric power network having a determined data transmission channel bandwidth, comprising the step of simultaneously asynchronously transmitting data over a plurality of peer-to-peer transmission channels established between said plurality of senders and said plurality of receivers.

2. The method of claim 1, said channel bandwidth being divided into a plurality of sub-channels, each of said parallel peer-to-peer transmission channels using a different one of said sub-channels.

3. The method of claim 2, said channel bandwidth being divided into a plurality of sub-channels using band-pass filters with high stop-band attenuation.

4. The method of claim 2, comprising the steps performed by the sender of

detecting data transmission activity on a plurality of said sub-channels and

selecting a sub-channel free of any data transmission activity for transmitting data.

5. The method of claim 1, said data transmission channel bandwidth being comprised in the frequency band of 1, 6 MHz to 40 MHz.

6. The method of claim 1, comprising the step of modulating said data with a Discrete Cosine Modulation filter bank.

7. The method of claim 1, comprising the step of modulating said data with a Wavelet Packet filter bank.

8. The method of claim 1, comprising the step of synchronizing each of said receivers with a corresponding sender.

9. The method of claim 8, said step of synchronizing being performed with a training sequence known from said receivers and transmitted by said corresponding senders.

10. The method of claim 1, data transmission over each of said peer-to-peer transmission channels being performed at a different transmission power.

11. The method of claim 10, said transmission power being adapted to the signal attenuation along the corresponding peer-to-peer transmission channel.

12. The method of claim 1, comprising the step of encrypting said data using a public-private key encryption method.

13. System for data communication comprising a plurality of communication devices for transmitting and/or receiving data over an electric power network having a determined data transmission channel bandwidth, said communication devices each comprising a transceiver system designed for asynchronously transmitting data over a plurality of peer-to-peer transmission channels established between said plurality of communication devices.

14. The system of claim 13, said transceiver system comprising a sender and/or a receiver.

15. The system of claim 13, each of said peer-to-peer transmission channels being established using a different sub-channel of said data transmission channel.

16. The system of claim 15, said sender and/or receiver comprising a filter bank for modulating and/or demodulating the data to be transmitted and/or received over said sub-channel using a plurality of sub-carriers.

17. The system of claim 16, said transceiver system being configured so as to transmit at different data rates and/or transmit power level for each one of said plurality of sub-carriers, depending on the transmission characteristics in the corresponding sub-carrier frequency range.

18. The system of claim 16, said filter bank being a Discrete Cosine Modulation filter bank.

19. The system of claim 16, said filter bank being a Wavelet Packet filter bank.

20. The system of claim 15, said transceiver system comprising an activity detector for detecting data transmission activity on a plurality of said sub-channels.

21. The system of claim 13, said receiver comprising a synchronization device for synchronizing said receiver with a corresponding sender.

22. The system of claim 21, said receiver being synchronized with the help of a training sequence known from the receiver and transmitted by the corresponding sender.