Advanced Optical Developments for inter-Satellite Communication

Lower cost: The cost of disposing FSO is lower than that of an RF with comparable data rate. There are no cables to deploy, no expensive rooftop installations required. Based on a recent finding done by an FSO company based in Canada 'fSONA', the cost per Mbps per month based on FSO is about half that of RF based systems [1]. Huge modulation bandwidth: Generally Optical carrier wavelength which includes infrared, visible and ultra violet comes within a range of few nanometers to few micrometers; correspond to a frequency of thousands of Terahertz which is far greater than RF frequency. In any communication system, the allowable bit rate of the channel determines its maximum bandwidth. Using optical frequency whose optical frequency ranges from 1012 1016 Hz could accommodate up to 2000 THz bandwidth. Thus information carrying capacity of FOS channel is highly increased with respect to RF capacity. Free from interference: Due to multi pass propagation of RF signal, fading is a very high problematic issue in radio wireless communication, but FSO seldom faces fading issue. Due to close proximity of RF carriers in RF spectrum, wireless RF communication faces interchannel and intra-channel interference. Optical frequencies are out of these problems, which is a great advantage. Quick to deploy and redeploy: The time taken for an FSO link to become fully operational starting from installation down to link alignment could be as low as four hours. The key requirement is the establishment of an unimpeded line of sight between the transmitter and the receiver.