Channel Estimation in Visible Light Communication Systems: The Effect of Input Signal-Dependent Noise

Visible light communication (VLC) has been proposed as a promising way for next generation wireless communication networks to mitigate the scarcity of the radio frequency (RF) spectrum, and has consequently attracted much attention. This article introduces a single-input single-output (SISO) VLC system under the joint effects of statistical random channel and signal-dependent shot noise (SDSN). Moreover, it estimates the channel of the considered system using maximum likelihood (ML), least square (LS), linear minimum mean square error (LMMSE), maximum posteriori probability (MAP) and minimum mean square error (MMSE) estimators. Furthermore, a Bayesian Crame-Rao lower bound (BCRLB) is derived for the proposed system and it is compared to the mean square error (MSE) of the proposed estimators. The problem of unknown SDSN factor, zeta(2), at the receiver side is discussed and two solutions are investigated. The receiver of a VLC system under SDSN and random channel gain h is designed and its BER is studied. Finally, Monte Carlo simulation results of the proposed estimators, which show the dramatic effect of the SDSN on the considered system, are provided. In particular, the presence of noise variance, as well as the SDSN factor, causes an increase in the MSE of the system, while increasing the power reinforces the system performance.