Free Space Optical Communication Tracking with Electronic Boresight Compensation and Co-Boresighted Transmit and Receive Optics
AssigneeSA Photonics, Inc.
InventorsWilliam C. Dickson, Andrew K. McClaren, Greg G. Mitchell
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Exemplary embodiments described herein include a bi-directional Free Space Optical (FSO) communication unit that may be used in a multi-node FSO communication system. The bi-directional FSO unit may include a co-boresighted optical unit such that received and transmitted beams are coincident through a common aperture. Embodiments described herein may be used to correct or accommodate the alignment errors of the received and transmitted beams.
Claims21
-15. (canceled)
A Free Space Optical (FSO) communication unit, comprising:
- co-boresighted beam steering unit configured to transmit and receive optical beams along a coincident path external to the FSO communication unit;
- a receiver beam detector configured to determine a position of the receive optical beam on the receiver beam detector;
- a transmit beam source for transmitting the transmit optical beam towards a direction;
- a Pointing, Acquisition, and Tracking (PAT) control system,
- wherein the PAT control system controls a direction of the transmit optical beam, and directs the transmit optical beam based on the position of the receive optical beam based on the position of the receive optical beam and an offset command,
- the offset command value is calculated for the FSO communication unit based on an error between the position of the receive optical beam and the direction of the transmit optical beam, the error caused by an optical misalignment of at least one optical component of the FSO communication unit.
A method of sending data from a co-boresighted beam steering unit of a Free Space Optical (FSO) communication unit on a transmitted optical beam at a first wavelength and receiving data at the co-boresighted beam steering unit on a received optical beam at a second wavelength different from the first wavelength, comprising:
- aligning paths of the transmitted optical beam with the received optical beam such that the paths extend through the co-boresighted beam steering unit and are coincident exterior to the FSO unit;
- calculating an error between a position of the received optical beam and a direction of the transmitted optical beam, the error caused by an optical misalignment of at least one optical component of the FSO communication unit;
- and
- positioning the transmitted optical beam according to an alignment of the received optical beam and the error.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.