Proceedings of SPIE, the International Society for Optical Engineering/Proceedings of SPIE · 2009 · 12 citations · 0 references
EngineeringElectrical EngineeringPhysicsOpticsOptoelectronicsPhotonicsFree-space OpticsOptical Communication SystemsOptical DetectorsOptical ModulationOptical ModulatorsPhotodetectorsFree-space Optical CommunicationOptical Communication LinksOptical Link DesignOptical ReceiversOptical TransceiversOptical Transmission SystemsPerformance DegradationReal-time Data Transmission
In this paper we discuss recent progress on the implementation of a hardware free-space optical communications test-bed. The test-bed implements an end-to-end communications system comprising a data encoder, modulator, laser-transmitter, telescope, detector, receiver and error-correction-code decoder. Implementation of each of the component systems is discussed, with an emphasis on 'real-world' system performance degradation and limitations. We have demonstrated real-time data rates of 44 Mbps and photon efficiencies of approximately 1.8 bits/photon over a 100m free-space optical link.