Optical communications will complement radio frequency (RF) communications in the coming decades to enhance throughput, power efficiency and link security of satellite communication links. To enable optical communications technology for intersatellite links and (bi-directional) ground to satellite links, TNO develops a suite of technologies in collaboration with industry. Throughout these developments there is a particular aim for high levels of system integration, compactness and low recurring cost in order to meet the overall requirements related to market viability. TNO develops terminals with aperture sizes of 70 and 17 mm, coarse pointing assemblies and fast steering mirrors. This paper discusses the state of development of these different technologies and provides and outlook towards the future.

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TNO is developing Deformable Mirror (DM) technology, targeted for aberration correction in high-end Adaptive Optics (AO) applications in the field of lithography, astronomy, space and laser communication. The heart of this deformable mirror technology is a unique actuator technology based on the variable reluctance principle. The main advantages of this technology are the inherent high reliability, linearity (>99%), and high efficiency in terms of force per volume and unit power. Based on this actuator technology TNO built and tested a prototype DM, with 57 actuators, and a mirror diameter of Ø160mm. The test results show a highly linear actuator response, with less than 1% hysteresis over a stroke of 40μm. Atmospheric aberration correction has been shown with these DM's in a free space laser-communication bread board. The same actuator technology is also used in the application of a highly compact Fine Steering Mirror (FSM), with an overall volume of Ø27x30mm, with a Ø20mm mirror. This FSM is targeted for satellite-based lasercommunication terminals. Furthermore, a design study has been carried out to show the scalability of this technology towards large (~Ø1m to ~Ø3m) adaptive (secondary) mirrors with several hundreds, up to thousands of actuators. In this paper these different DM and FSM's are discussed, and the latest test results obtained with the DM prototypes are presented.@en

TNO and DLR envision optical free-space communication between ground stations and geostationary telecommunication satellites to replace the traditional RF links for the next generation of Very High Throughput Satellites. To mitigate atmospheric turbulence, an Adaptive Optics (AO) system will be used. TNO and DLR are developing breadboards to validate Terabit/s communication links using an AO system. In this paper the breadboard activities and first results of the sub-systems will be presented. Performance of these subsystems will be evaluated for viability of terabit/s optical feeder links.@en

This paper presents the activities performed by TNO in the field of Space Laser Communication Terminals for high-volume low cost applications, and its plans for the further development of the required technologies for space terminals with particular emphasis on highly reliable, high performance, cost effective terminals.

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To overcome data rate limitations of RF communication links with satellites, TNO and DLR envision optical free-space communication feeder links for next generation high throughput satellites. This paper provides a feasibility assessment of such links and the technology needed. The main results of the link budget and the turbulence modeling of terabit/s optical links are presented. Based on these parameters, requirements and status of the link-subsystems are discussed, and a roadmap is presented, aimed at achieving terabit per second optical feeder links.

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Optical communications will complement radio frequency (RF) communications in the coming decades to enhance throughput, power efficiency and link security of satellite communication links. To enable optical communications technology for intersatellite links and (bi-directional) ground to satellite links, TNO develops a suite of technologies in collaboration with industry, which comprises of terminals with different aperture sizes, coarse pointing assemblies and fast steering mirrors. This paper presents the current state of the development of TNO technology for optical space communications. It mainly focuses on the development of an optical head with an entrance aperture of 70 mm, an optical bench for CubeSats and coarse pointing assemblies (CPAs). By continuing these steps, world wide web based on satellite communications will come closer.

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