Experimental investigation of Vortex Beams for inter-satellite Free Space Optical Communications
E.J.E. Pauwels (TU Delft - Aerospace Engineering)
P. Piron – Mentor (TU Delft - Aerospace Engineering)
M. Badas Aldecocea – Mentor (TU Delft - Aerospace Engineering)
J.J.D. Loicq – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Aerospace Engineering)
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Abstract
Free space optical communication presents many benefits over traditional radio frequency communication such as increased bandwidth and decreased beam divergence. However, on satellite terminals, spacecraft jitter causes instantaneous pointing errors, which due to the Gaussian intensity profile of most lasers, results in lower received power and thus a decrease in communication performance metrics like bit error rate and power outage probability.
Using non-Gaussian intensity profiles theoretically alleviates this drop in performance but requires more components than a standard optical communication system. In this thesis, an experimental optical setup using a spiral phase plate was constructed to obtain a superposition of a Gaussian and an annular beam. The resulting intensity profile closely matched the theoretical while having an overall transmissive efficiency high enough to outperform a Gaussian profile in power outage probability. This experiment has shown the real potential that non-Gaussian intensity profiles have in satellite free space optical communication.