Free-space high-speed laser communication link across the Chesapeake Bay

Christopher I. Moore; Harris R. Burris Jr.; Michele R. Suite; Mena F. Stell; Michael J. Vilcheck; Mark A. Davis; R. Smith; R. Mahon; William S. Rabinovich; Jeffrey P. Koplow; S. W. Moore; William J. Scharpf; Anne E. Reed

doi:10.1117/12.451462

9 December 2002 Free-space high-speed laser communication link across the Chesapeake Bay

Christopher I. Moore, Harris R. Burris Jr., Michele R. Suite, Mena F. Stell, Michael J. Vilcheck, Mark A. Davis, R. Smith, R. Mahon, William S. Rabinovich, Jeffrey P. Koplow, S. W. Moore, William J. Scharpf, Anne E. Reed

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 4821, Free-Space Laser Communication and Laser Imaging II; (2002) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.451462
Event: International Symposium on Optical Science and Technology, 2002, Seattle, WA, United States

Abstract

The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) has established a free-space laser communication link across 16.2 km of the Chesapeake Bay between the Chesapeake Bay Detachment of NRL and Tilghman Island. The transmitter consists of a modulated 1550 nm oscillator amplified to 2 watts in an erbium doped fiber amplifier developed at NRL. The beam is fiber coupled to a 4 inch collimating lens on a remotely controllable gimbal mount. The beam is transmitted to a retro-reflector array at Tilghman Island and back to the receiver at CBD (32.4 km round trip). The receiver consists of a 16" Meade telescope either directly or fiber coupled to a variety of fast photo-detectors. Experiments have been conducted to study the stability and quality of the link. These include: bit-error rate measurements, probability density functions, power spectrum densities, and angle of arrival measurements of the received signal. Results of these experiments are presented.

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Christopher I. Moore, Harris R. Burris Jr., Michele R. Suite, Mena F. Stell, Michael J. Vilcheck, Mark A. Davis, R. Smith, R. Mahon, William S. Rabinovich, Jeffrey P. Koplow, S. W. Moore, William J. Scharpf, and Anne E. Reed "Free-space high-speed laser communication link across the Chesapeake Bay", Proc. SPIE 4821, Free-Space Laser Communication and Laser Imaging II, (9 December 2002); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.451462

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