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Wireless Optical Communication: Inter-Satellite Optical Link for Higher Data Exchange

Author : Manoj Kumar and Sanjay Chauhan

Abstract :

Inter-satellite Optical wireless communication has been attracting worldwide attention because of the growing need for larger capacity and higher speed transmissions of observation data thanks to the recent improvements in the performance of Earth observation satellites and because of its features such as not needing the frequency coordination and the ease in which confidentiality is ensured compared to radio frequency (RF) communication. Satellite cross links generally require narrower bandwidths for increased power concentration. We can increase the power concentration by increasing the cross link frequency with the same size antenna. But the source technology and the modulation hardware required at these higher frequency bands are still in the development stage. Use of optical frequencies will help to overcome this problem with the availability of feasible light sources and the existence of efficient optical modulation communications links with optical beams are presently being given serious considerations in inter-satellite links. And establishing an optical cross link requires first the initial acquisition and cracking of the beacon by the transmitting satellite followed by a pointing of the LASER beam after which data can be modulated and transmitted. This paper introduces a future space system based on optical inter-satellite communication as well as the features and technologies of the laser communication terminal for satellites developed for JAXA’s optical data relay and earth observation satellites.

Keywords :

Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN), Space-Air Ground Integrated Networks (SAGIN), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), Deep Learning (DL), 5G-Advanced, 6G