LiFi: Internet connection powered by light

Imagine a future where your internet connection is beamed across your office from the overhead lights.

Using a standard light fitting attached to an internet connection, LiFi sends data to a receiver attached to a computer by means of rapid, invisible, flickering of the light source.

Professor Harald Haas is now commercialising the technology with a company spun out of Edinburgh University.

Right now the prototype device is too large to be attractive to consumers, but the team says eventually it should be small enough to integrate into a mobile phone.

They will be showing off its capabilities at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Professor Haas demonstrated the technology to Rory Cellan-Jones.