Space Lasers Come of Age: Optical Communications for Satellites Are Ready for Prime Time

From S-band through C-band, to X-band and K-band, radio frequency, or RF, satellite communications have evolved from low frequency dial-up speeds to today’s multi-gigabit per second very high throughput satellites using wavelengths under one centimeter. What took so long? A New Technological Paradig...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inVia Satellite DIGITAL
Format Trade Publication Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Potomac Access Intelligence LLC 01.03.2022
Subjects
Bandwidths
C band
Fiber optics
Geosynchronous orbits
Ground stations
Lasers
Low earth orbits
Moon
Optical communication
Radio frequency
Receivers & amplifiers
Satellite communications
Spectrum allocation
Superhigh frequencies
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Summary:From S-band through C-band, to X-band and K-band, radio frequency, or RF, satellite communications have evolved from low frequency dial-up speeds to today’s multi-gigabit per second very high throughput satellites using wavelengths under one centimeter. What took so long? A New Technological Paradigm One factor which caused delays in deploying the technology, according to Thomas Wood, senior director for Optical Communications and Networking for defense and government contractor CACI, is that laser communications are a completely new paradigm. Satellites in orbit are moving at 17,000 mph in Low-Earth Orbit (LEO), and laser communications employ much narrower beams than RF, “That means that the precision of the pointing has to be much higher. ILLUMA-T will make ISS the first orbital user of NASA’s Laser Communications Relay Demonstration, a Geostationary Orbit (GEO) satellite launched last year that can receive optical communications from other satellites and spacecraft and beam them down to earth.