Necessity of received RF voltage drive for direct antenna to electro-optic modulator in distributed antenna system

Integrated antenna for Electro-Optic Modulator has become an applicable solution in Distributed Antenna System (DAS). DAS, also known as In Building Coverage/System (IBC/S), mostly still uses coaxial cable as a transmission medium in the building. This paper proposed to use the electro-optic modulator as Photonic Antenna in DAS. The research has been conducted theoretically based on empirical reference data to design the DAS configuration. Such data was simulated using the Pathloss software to calculate the back calculation power in DAS. Furthermore, DAS configuration system in this paper was designed by using Mach-Zehnder modulator which was simulated using OptiSystem. DAS system was not using electrical or optical amplifier in the system. Based on the result of the modelling system, simulation measuring result showed that the use of the direct antenna to electro-optic modulator has further made output power more efficient up to a photodetector. Pathloss simulation result showed that the power obtained by RF donor antenna was -39.13 dBm; while OptiSystem simulation result showed that a one km away from the RF donor antenna, photodetector output power in the form of RF signal was -31 dBm. Power efficiency was obtained around 8 dB if compared with donor antenna output power.