Performance Enhancement of Telemedicine Network by Free Space Optics Links Provisioning

Abstract

Health care has benefited immensely with the implementation of fast moving information technology. It is a challenging assignment for the researchers to implement the present day technologies such as wireless mesh networks. Wireless mesh networks are deployed to guarantee a reliable and stable network infrastructure backbone to telemedicine systems. They are preferred to other wireless networks, as the solution which they provide is robust for broadband services. They are robust because if routing is not possible due to some mesh nodes failure, routing can be done by the other mesh nodes present. Wireless mesh network cannot only spread coverage but also save both cabling cost and human resource. However, their performance is degraded due to interference and varying load. Interference is a critical issue in wireless mesh networks. The interference occurs because of the congested unlicensed radio frequency spectrum. This problem can be addressed by applying free space optics technology for transmission instead of radio frequency technology in the unlicensed spectrum. Network capacity issue is addressed by provisioning free space optics links to generate the much needed throughput and to minimize interference. Telemedicine network is a network, which requires a high capacity bandwidth to cater for a large number of remote patients. It is observed that free space optics links provisioning results in a significant performance enhancement for the telemedicine network.