Saiful Islam

CAN WE USE 5G IN THE SEAWATER?

Most of the underwater wireless networks use an acoustic wave as a transmission medium but
it has a certain problem such as limited bandwidth, Poor performance in shallow water, Strong
reflections and attenuation when transmitting through water/air boundary, etc.

So, It’s time to think about it differently. What if we use 5G for underwater communications?
EM propagation through water is very different from propagation through air because of the
high permittivity and electrical conductivity of seawater. Propagating waves continually cycle
energy between electric and magnetic fields; hence, high conduction leads to strong
attenuation. Plane-wave attenuation also increases rapidly with frequency. Here is the table of
the electrical properties of air and water.
Name Air Seawater
Relative permittivity (𝜀𝑟 ) 1.0006 81
Relative permeability 𝜇𝑟 1.0000004 0.999991
Bulk Conductivity (𝜎) 0 4 Siemens/m
So, on the table, we can see the difference between air and seawater. In seawater relative
permittivity is much higher than the air. Also, seawater has significant conductivity on the
other hand for the case of air it's zero. So, these factors will affect EM. There is some
important equation to find out difference between seawater and air.
Intrinsic Impedance in air
𝜇𝑟
Intrinsic Impedance in seawater η = 𝜂𝑜 = 41.85…...Ohm
𝜀𝑟

So, here intrinsic impedance nine times higher in air than seawater. In the bellow, I have added
some other factors that also affects in seawater.
where,
Wavelength 𝜐= Velocity of EM wave
Velocity 𝑓= 3.5 GHz
𝜇𝑟 = 1
𝜀𝑟 = 81
𝜎= 4 S/m
= 32378526.56 m/s
𝜀 = 7.168 ∗ 1010 F/m
c= 3 ∗ 108 m/s
So, Wavelength 𝜆=0.009251007589 m in the seawater. 𝜔= 2𝜋𝑓

In the following equations, It’s clear that speed of EM wave in the seawater is around nine
times less than the speed of Air in the certain frequency and Conductivity though it’s not always
same because water permittivity and conductivity is not same everywhere it also changes with
the types of water. So, in seawater wavelength of the EM will be much less small than Air. For
high frequency, the wavelength will be very small. Antenna dimensions will be different in
water than air as well. Finally, I would say 5G is not usable in the water.