Atmospheric channel effects on terrestrial free space optical communication links

Abstract. This paper illustrates the challenges imposed by the atmospheric channel on the design of a terrestrial laser communication link. The power loss due to scattering effect is described using the Kim/Kruse scattering model while the effect and the penalty imposed by atmospheric turbulence is highlighted by considering the bit error rate (BER) of an On-Off Keying modulated link in an optical Poisson channel. The power loss due to thick fog can measure over 100 dB/km while snow and rain result in much lower attenuation. We show that non-uniformity in the atmospheric temperature also contributes to performance deterioration due to scintillation effect. At a BER of 10-4, for a channel with a turbulence strength of>0.1, the penalty imposed by turbulence induced fading is over 20 photoelectron counts in order to achieve the same level of performance as a channel with no fading. The work reported here is part of the EU COST actions and EU projects.

Performance of free space optical communication using M-array receivers at atmospheric conditions

Abstract: In free space optical (FSO) communication links, atmospheric parameters including absorption, scattering and turbulence have significant impacts on the quality of laser beams propagating through the atmosphere. Absorption and/or scattering, due to atmospheric particles result in optical losses, whereas turbulence contributes to the intensity scintillation that can severely impair the operation of FSO communications systems. In this paper, using a modified model we analyze the atmospheric effects on the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and the bit error rate (BER) of an FSO system. We show that there is an improvement in BER when using M-array receivers instead of one a single receiver

A novel satellite mission concept for upper air water vapour, aerosol and cloud observations using integrated path differential absorption LiDAR limb sounding

We propose a new satellite mission to deliver high quality measurements of upper air water vapour. The concept centres around a LiDAR in limb sounding by occultation geometry, designed to operate as a very long path system for differential absorption measurements. We present a preliminary performance analysis with a system sized to send 75 mJ pulses at 25 Hz at four wavelengths close to 935 nm, to up to 5 microsatellites in a counter-rotating orbit, carrying retroreflectors characterized by a reflected beam divergence of roughly twice the emitted laser beam divergence of 15 µrad. This provides water vapour profiles with a vertical sampling of 110 m; preliminary calculations suggest that the system could detect concentrations of less than 5 ppm. A secondary payload of a fairly conventional medium resolution multispectral radiometer allows wide-swath cloud and aerosol imaging. The total weight and power of the system are estimated at 3 tons and 2,700 W respectively. This novel concept presents significant challenges, including the performance of the lasers in space, the tracking between the main spacecraft and the retroreflectors, the refractive effects of turbulence, and the design of the telescopes to achieve a high signal-to-noise ratio for the high precision measurements. The mission concept was conceived at the Alpbach Summer School 2010

Long-distance quantum communication with atomic ensembles and linear optics

Quantum communication holds a promise for absolutely secure transmission of secret messages and faithful transfer of unknown quantum states. Photonic channels appear to be very attractive for physical implementation of quantum communication. However, due to losses and decoherence in the channel, the communication fidelity decreases exponentially with the channel length. We describe a scheme that allows to implement robust quantum communication over long lossy channels. The scheme involves laser manipulation of atomic ensembles, beam splitters, and single-photon detectors with moderate efficiencies, and therefore well fits the status of the current experimental technology. We show that the communication efficiency scale polynomially with the channel length thereby facilitating scalability to very long distances.Comment: 2 tex files (Main text + Supplement), 4 figure

Free space laser telecommunication through fog

Atmospheric clearness is a key issue for free space optical communications (FSO). We present the first active method to achieve FSO through clouds and fog, using ultrashort high intensity laser filaments. The laser filaments opto-mechanically expel the droplets out of the beam and create a cleared channel for transmitting high bit rate telecom data at 1.55 microns. The low energy required for the process allows considering applications to Earth-satellite FSO and secure ground based optical communication, with classical or quantum protocols.Comment: 4 pages + 2 pages supplementary text and movie

Polarization Imperfections of Light in Interferometry

Disertační práce pojednává o polarizačních nedokonalostech optických komponentů, které jsou využívány ke kontrole a k transformaci polarizačního stavu světla. Získané teoretické výsledky jsou pak využity ve vybraných aplikacích, jež ke své činnosti využívají právě polarizace světla. Konkrétně se jedná o zařízení měřící vibrace oscilujících objektů, dále o interferenční měření dvojlomu v transparentních materiálech a konečně, o vybraná témata z optické kvantové komunikace.The emphasis of the dissertation is put on the investigating of polarization imperfections of optical components which are used to control and transform polarization of light. The theoretical results of this investigation are then applied to different applications which exploit light polarization, namely to the arrangements for high-resolution measurement of vibrating targets, to interferometric measurements for the determination of stress-induced birefringence in transparent materials and to the selected topics in quantum optical communication.

Free-space quantum links under diverse weather conditions

Free-space optical communication links are promising channels for establishing secure quantum communication. Here we study the transmission of nonclassical light through a turbulent atmospheric link under diverse weather conditions, including rain or haze. To include these effects, the theory of light transmission through atmospheric links in the elliptic-beam approximation presented by Vasylyev et al. [D. Vasylyev et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 117, 090501 (2016); arXiv:1604.01373] is further generalized.It is demonstrated, with good agreement between theory and experiment, that low-intensity rain merely contributes additional deterministic losses, whereas haze also introduces additional beam deformations of the transmitted light. Based on these results, we study theoretically the transmission of quadrature squeezing and Gaussian entanglement under these weather conditions.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figure

Current optical technologies for wireless access

The objective of this paper is to describe recent activities and investigations on free-space optics (FSO) or optical wireless and the excellent results achieved within SatNEx an EU-framework 6th programme and IC 0802 a COST action. In a first part, the FSO technology is briefly discussed. In a second part, we mention some performance evaluation criterions for the FSO. In third part, we briefly discuss some optical signal propagation experiments through the atmosphere by mentioning network architectures for FSO and then discuss the recent investigations in airborne and satellite application experiments for FSO. In part four, we mention some recent investigation results on modelling the FSO channel under fog conditions and atmospheric turbulence. Additionally, some recent major performance improvement results obtained by employing hybrid systems and using some specific modulation and coding schemes are presented

A Raman anemometer for component-selective velocity measurements of particles in a flow

An anemometer for the measurement of the velocity of particles of different components in a flow, separate and apart from that of the flow itself, is described. As a component-selective mechanism Raman scattering is used. The velocity is measured by relating the autocorrelated scattering signal to the known laser beam profile