Remotely reconfigurable distributed antenna system and methods

A method for operating a Distributed Antenna System (DAS), the method comprising:

• providing one or more remote radio units, each of the one or more remote radio units being configured to receive one or more downlink radio frequencies and to transmit one or more uplink radio frequencies;
• providing at least one digital access unit (DAU) configured to communicate with at least some of the one or more remote radio units;
• receiving, at the at least one DAU, RF signals from a base transceiver station (BTS);
• digitizing, at the at least one DAU, the received RF signals to provide digitized signals;
• I/Q mapping and framing the digitized signals, at the at least one DAU, to provide packetized signals;
• and
• transmitting the packetized signals from the at least one DAU to the one or more remote radio units.

A method of communicating in a distributed antenna system (DAS), the method comprising:

• receiving downlink optical signals at a remote radio unit, the downlink optical signals received from a digital access unit, the downlink optical signals comprising a plurality of carriers;
• converting a portion of the downlink optical signals received at the remote radio unit to downlink RF signals, the portion of the downlink optical signals corresponding to a subset of the plurality of carriers, wherein a number of carriers in the subset of the plurality of carriers is less than a number of carriers in the plurality of carriers, and a number of carriers in the subset of the plurality of carriers is configurable;
• transmitting the downlink RF signals from the remote radio unit;
• receiving uplink RF signals at the remote radio unit;
• converting the uplink RF signals received at the remote radio unit to uplink optical signals, wherein the uplink optical signals correspond to the subset of the plurality of carriers;
• and
• sending the uplink optical signals from the remote radio unit to the digital access unit.