Systems and methods for providing power and data to devices

A method to control illumination intensity of a lighting system that includes a plurality of LED lights and a plurality of lighting modules, wherein one or more LED lights of the plurality of LED lights is associated with each lighting module of the plurality of lighting modules and each LED light is configured to receive a pulse width modulation (PWM) signal to control the illumination intensity, and a two-wire communication network configured to transmit a data encoded power signal to at least one lighting module of the plurality of lighting modules, wherein the data encoded power signal provides power and command and address data to the at least one lighting module of the plurality of lighting modules, the method comprising:

• acquiring at a user interface user input that comprises the illumination intensity of at least one of the one or more LED lights;
• outputting information based at least in part on the user input;
• receiving with a processor the information and outputting with the processor the command and address data responsive to the information;
• modifying with a power supply an input voltage of a power source in response to the command and address data to produce the data encoded power signal;
• transmitting over the two-wire communication network the data encoded power signal to the at least one lighting module of the plurality of lighting modules, the at least one lighting module including a zero-crossing detector configured to detect zero-crossings of the data encoded power signal and a counter configured to count a number of zero-crossing;
• decoding the illumination intensity data from the data encoded power signal with the at least one lighting module;
• outputting the PWM signal responsive to the decoded illumination intensity data with the at least one lighting module;
• and
• using the data encoded power signal as a time base to synchronize the PWM signal to the data encoded power signal with the at least one lighting module.

A lighting controller to control illumination intensity of a lighting system that includes a plurality of lighting modules, each lighting module of the plurality of lighting modules including one or more LED lights, each LED light configured to receive a pulse width modulation (PWM) signal to control illumination intensity, and a two-wire communication network configured to transmit a data encoded power signal to at least one lighting module of the plurality of lighting modules to provide power and command and address data to the at least one lighting module of the plurality of lighting modules, the lighting controller comprising:

• a user interface configured to acquire user input that comprises at least an illumination intensity of at least one of the one or more LED lights and to output information based at least in part on the user input;
• a processor in communication with the user interface, the processor configured to accept the information and to output the command and address data responsive to the information;
• and
• a power supply operatively coupled to a power source and the two-wire communication network, the power supply in communication with the processor to receive the command and address data, the power supply configured to modify an input voltage of the power source to produce the data encoded power signal responsive to the command and address data;
• wherein the at least one module of the plurality of modules is configured to receive the data encoded power signal via the two-wire communication network, wherein at least one addressed module is configured to decode illumination intensity data from the data encoded power signal, and output the PWM signal responsive to the decoded illumination intensity data, and wherein the at least one addressed module is configured to use the data encoded power signal as a time base to synchronize the PWM signal to the data encoded power signal.