초록 ▼

An optical system for remotely optical communications at a high data rate between a base station and a remote station under atmospheric turbulence conditions is disclosed. The remote station includes an entirely different type of retroreflector that does not use the conventional type of retroreflect

An optical system for remotely optical communications at a high data rate between a base station and a remote station under atmospheric turbulence conditions is disclosed. The remote station includes an entirely different type of retroreflector that does not use the conventional type of retroreflection, but instead consists of two sets of lenslets coupled with single-mode fiber array, called fiber “retro”. Amplified retromodulation is achieved requiring only one single optical amplifier and one single modulator. A transmitter located at the base station sends an interrogating optical beam to the fiber “retro” which modulates the optical beam according to the input signal/data, and redirects the modulated optical beam to the base station for detection by a receiver. The present invention includes the capabilities of providing Identification of Friend-or-Foe (IFF), secure communication, and a means of achieving a wide field-of-view (FOV) with a fiber-coupled lenselet array.

대표청구항 ▼

1. A system for remote communication and data monitoring, comprising: a base station and a remote station, said base station comprising transmitter-receiver means to transmit an interrogation optical beam to said remote station, and a receiver at said base station to detect the returned signal from

1. A system for remote communication and data monitoring, comprising: a base station and a remote station, said base station comprising transmitter-receiver means to transmit an interrogation optical beam to said remote station, and a receiver at said base station to detect the returned signal from the said remote station; said remote station comprising: receiving optics including a wide-angle large format telecentric lens coupled to an input lenslet array, the input lenslet array further coupled to an array of single mode fibers that accept return light received from the interrogator, each single mode fiber of the array of single mode fibers including a single mode fiber tap and each single mode fiber tap coupled to a separate photodetector and electronics, whereby said electronics are used to identify the single mode fiber in said single mode fiber array that receives a return signal with the highest intensity, the single mode fiber array further coupled to an optical amplifier to amplify the return signal, and the amplifier further coupled to a return signal modulator;transmit exit optics including a wide-angle telecentric lens to retro-reflect back to the interrogator location the amplified and modulated return signal exiting from a spatial router fiber element that corresponds to the input lenslet array element with the highest received signal, said transmitting exit optics co-aligned with the input lenslet array and coupled to an output array of single mode fibers so that there is a one-to-one correspondence between the direction of reception and transmission; anda spatial router control device including electronics to switch said single mode fiber spatial router to a specific single mode fiber of said output array of single mode fibers to retro-reflect the return signal back to the interrogator and further including a sensor that collects data with a data buffer to store said data. 2. The system of claim 1; wherein said telecentric lens comprises a wide-angled lens with a large format putting the far-field plane of the received signal at the input plane of the said input lenslet array making each lenslet in the array to correspond to a different input-beam angle, and thus different direction to the laser interrogator, and wherein said system provides a novel means of determining the exact angular location of the source. 3. The system of claim 1, wherein a two-dimensional lenslet array is used to obtain large field-of-view (FOV) to accept a wide-angle incident light. 4. The system of claim 1, wherein a second separate two-dimensional lenslet array is used to transmit the return signal at any wide-angle within the a field-of-view (FOV) of the remote station. 5. The system of claim 1, wherein said system comprises only one single low noise, low power-consuming optical amplifier for amplifying the optical signals at said receiving optics input lenslet array outputs. 6. The system of claim 1, wherein: said system comprises only one single modulator for modulating the optically amplified signals; andsaid data buffer provides the signals to modulate the amplified optical signal by the modulator. 7. The system of claim 2, further comprises a low outcoupling fiber tap combined with a slow-speed photodetector attached to each coupler to detect the input time-averaged powers in order to identify the particular input lenslet array element which receives the largest incident signal from the interrogator. 8. The system of claim 2 further comprising electronics which detect the single mode fiber of the single mode fiber array of said receiving optics receiving the highest intensity input signal and which electronically switch a single mode fiber spatial router (1×N) coupled thereto to the correct single mode fiber of said output array of single mode fibers of the transmitting exit optics for retro-reflection to the interrogator. 9. The system of claim 1, comprises a data buffer which receives data from a monitoring sensor, and could either output real-time data or data stored over some previous time interval.