Development of the Optical Communications Telescope Laboratory: A Laser Communications Relay Demonstration Ground Station

The Laser Communications Relay Demonstration (LCRD) project will demonstrate high bandwidth space to ground bi-directional optical communications links between a geosynchronous satellite and two LCRD optical ground stations located in the southwestern United States. The project plans to operate for two years with a possible extension to five. Objectives of the demonstration include the development of operational strategies to prototype optical link and relay services for the next generation tracking and data relay satellites. Key technologies to be demonstrated include adaptive optics to correct for clear air turbulence-induced wave front aberrations on the downlink, and advanced networking concepts for assured and automated data delivery. Expanded link availability will be demonstrated by supporting operations at small sun-Earth-probe angles. Planned optical modulation formats support future concepts of nearEarth satellite user services to a maximum of 1.244 Gb/s differential phase shift keying modulation and pulse position modulations formats for deep space links at data rates up to 311 Mb/s. Atmospheric monitoring instruments that will characterize the optical channel during the link include a sun photometer to measure atmospheric transmittance, a solar scintillometer, and a cloud camera to measure the line of sight cloud cover. This paper describes the planned development of the JPL optical ground station GS-1.

[1]  R. G. Lipes.  Pulse-Position-Modulation Coding as Near-Optimum Utilization of Photon Counting Channel with Bandwidth and Power Constraints , 1980 .

[2]  E. J. Seykora.  Solar scintillation and the monitoring of solar seeing , 1993 .

[3]  Michael C. Roggemann,et al.  Characterization of atmospheric turbulence phase statistics using wave-front slope measurements , 1996 .

[4]  Jon Hamkins,et al.  Coded Modulation for the Deep-Space Optical Channel: Serially Concatenated Pulse-Position Modulation , 2005 .

[5]  Don M. Boroson,et al.  Analysis of capacity and probability of outage for free-space optical channels with fading due to pointing and tracking error , 2006, SPIE LASE.

[6]  Keith E. Wilson,et al.  Automatic aircraft detection to support aircraft spotters during outdoor laser propagation , 2007 .

[7]  Scott C. Burleigh,et al.  Bundle Protocol Specification , 2007, RFC.

[8]  Κ. E. Wilson,et al.  Laser operations at the JPL/NASA OCTL facility , 2007 .

[9]  Stephen Farrell,et al.  Licklider Transmission Protocol - Specification , 2008, RFC.

[10]  Sabino Piazzolla,et al.  Infrared cloud imaging in support of Earth-space optical communication. , 2009, Optics express.

[11]  D. M. Boroson,et al.  The Lunar Laser Communications Demonstration (LLCD) , 2009, 2009 Third IEEE International Conference on Space Mission Challenges for Information Technology.

[12]  Larry C. Andrews,et al.  Near-ground vertical profile of refractive-index fluctuations , 2009, Defense + Commercial Sensing.

[13]  Thomas G. Bifano,et al.  Shaping light: MOEMS deformable mirrors for microscopes and telescopes , 2010, MOEMS-MEMS.

[14]  Joshua Schoolcraft,et al.  Experimental characterization of space optical communications with disruption-tolerant network protocols , 2011, 2011 International Conference on Space Optical Systems and Applications (ICSOS).

[15]  Christoph Baranec,et al.  Results from the PALM-3000 high-order adaptive optics system , 2012, Other Conferences.

[16]  Keith E. Wilson,et al.  Overview of the Laser Communications Relay Demonstration Project , 2012 .

[17]  Jean C. Shelton,et al.  Design and implementation of the PALM-3000 real-time control system , 2012, Other Conferences.