Traffic light to vehicle visible light communication channel characterization.

Outdoor visible light communication (VLC) between an LED traffic light and an automobile has been proposed for intelligent transportation system development. An unobstructed line-of-sight (LOS) channel has to be guaranteed for this communication system. In this paper, an analytical LOS path loss model is proposed and validated by the measurement results. Commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) LED traffic lights are characterized for use as transmitters and possible interference sources are studied, such as background solar radiation and artificial lighting. Accordingly, the performance of an outdoor VLC system is evaluated using different modulation schemes.