Indoor Channel Characteristics for Visible Light Communications

In this letter, we present indoor multipath dispersion characteristics for visible light communications (VLC). Since the VLC uses a wide spectrum between 380 nm and 780 nm, the conventional narrowband model for infrared may not apply. We generalize the Barry’s model by including wavelength-dependent white LED characteristics and spectral reflectance of indoor reflectors. We perform a computer simulation to compare the power delay profile of the VLC with that of infrared communications. From our studies, we show that the VLC provides a larger transmission bandwidth than infrared communications.