The Poisson Channel at Low Input Powers

Abstract: The asymptotic capacity at low input powers of an average-power limited or an average- and peak-power limited discrete-time Poisson channel is considered. For a Poisson channel whose dark current is zero or decays to zero linearly with its average input power $E$, capacity scales like $E\log\frac{1}{E}$ for small $E$. For a Poisson channel whose dark current is a nonzero constant, capacity scales, to within a constant, like $E\log\log\frac{1}{E}$ for small $E$.