How do an IR transmitter and receiver work?

The IR transmitter consists of the LED that emits the IR(Infra Red) radiation.This is received by the photo diode, which acts as IR receiver at the receiving end. Since the IR radiation is invisible to human eye it is perfect for using in wireless communication. A electronic remote device mainly consists of this IR transmitter and receiver. A remote control patterns a flash of invisible light which is turned into an instruction and is received by the receiver module. So how it works? The IR signal is modulated during transmission. Modulation means assigning pattern to the data to be sent to the receiver.The most commonly used IR modulation is about 38khz.