Brief History
Optical transmission of data has been around for centuries. From old civilizations using fire and smoke signals in order to send messages from village to village to sending life saving SOS light signals on sinking ships. The invention of the laser in 1960 revolutionized this form of communication by providing a intense and narrow beam of focused light. This beam could travel much greater distances with much less attenuation than earlier optical transmission medium.
Since the space age began communication systems have relied on radio communications technology to talk with spacecrafts. Even with incredible advances in RF comm technology those systems are becoming outdated and lagging behind laser optic communications. Currently lasers are in significant use in ground based communications systems. Fiber optic cabling for long distance transmission generally uses lasers as the source of light for the signal being transmitted through the cable. Not until a few decades did space optical communications for both transmitting and receiving data really start. In 1977 the European Space Agency (ESA) began the first major study contract of using optical laser communication for satellite-to-satellite transmission. Still not until this past decade have we actually seen successful optical communications for more than low earth orbit system distances. in the beginning of this decade in 2001 the very first inter-satellite communication link was established. In 2006 the Japanese Space Agency (JAXA) demonstrated a bidirectional optical link between one of their satellites and another owned by the ESA. Even more recently, in 2011 NASA has started its Laser Communications Relay Demonstration (LCRD) space terminal which will provide extremely high bandwidth communications for future space missions.
Laser communication will have a pivotal role in providing crucially high data rates and capacity. radio and microwaves have some inevitable downfalls that make data communications increasingly difficult at extremely long distances. Optical laser transmission has many inherent advantages compared with RF transmission.
Since the space age began communication systems have relied on radio communications technology to talk with spacecrafts. Even with incredible advances in RF comm technology those systems are becoming outdated and lagging behind laser optic communications. Currently lasers are in significant use in ground based communications systems. Fiber optic cabling for long distance transmission generally uses lasers as the source of light for the signal being transmitted through the cable. Not until a few decades did space optical communications for both transmitting and receiving data really start. In 1977 the European Space Agency (ESA) began the first major study contract of using optical laser communication for satellite-to-satellite transmission. Still not until this past decade have we actually seen successful optical communications for more than low earth orbit system distances. in the beginning of this decade in 2001 the very first inter-satellite communication link was established. In 2006 the Japanese Space Agency (JAXA) demonstrated a bidirectional optical link between one of their satellites and another owned by the ESA. Even more recently, in 2011 NASA has started its Laser Communications Relay Demonstration (LCRD) space terminal which will provide extremely high bandwidth communications for future space missions.
Laser communication will have a pivotal role in providing crucially high data rates and capacity. radio and microwaves have some inevitable downfalls that make data communications increasingly difficult at extremely long distances. Optical laser transmission has many inherent advantages compared with RF transmission.