CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS
Advanced Search
Home > Proceedings > Volume 6951 > Article
Open Access Paper
18 April 2008 Free space optical communications: coming of age
Larry B. Stotts, Brian Stadler, Gary Lee
Author Affiliations +
Proceedings Volume 6951, Atmospheric Propagation V; 69510W (2008) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.783798
Event: SPIE Defense and Security Symposium, 2008, Orlando, Florida, United States
Abstract
Information superiority, where for the military or business, is the decisive advantage of the 21st Century. While business enjoys the information advantage of robust, high-bandwidth fiber optic connectivity that heavily leverages installed commercial infrastructure and service providers, mobile military forces need the wireless equivalent to leverage that advantage. In other words, an ability to deploy anywhere on the globe and maintain a robust, reliable communications and connectivity infrastructure, equivalent to that enjoyed by a CONUS commercial user, will provide US forces with information superiority. Assured high-data-rate connectivity to the tactical user is the biggest gap in developing and truly exploiting the potential of the information superiority weapon. Though information superiority is much discussed and its potential is well understood, a robust communications network available to the lowest military echelons is not yet an integral part of the force structure, although high data rate RF communications relays, e.g., Tactical Common Data Link, and low data SATCOM, e.g, Ku Spread Spectrum, are deployed and used by the military. This may change with recent advances in laser communications technologies created by the fiber optic communications revolution. This paper will provide a high level overview of the various laser communications programs conducted over the last 30 plus years, and proposed efforts to get these systems finally deployed.
© (2008) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Citation Download Citation
Larry B. Stotts, Brian Stadler, and Gary Lee "Free space optical communications: coming of age", Proc. SPIE 6951, Atmospheric Propagation V, 69510W (18 April 2008); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.783798
PROCEEDINGS
 15 PAGES
DOWNLOAD PAPER SAVE TO MY LIBRARY
GET CITATION
Lens.org Logo
CITATIONS
Cited by 24 scholarly publications.
Advertisement
Advertisement
RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS
Get copyright permission  Get copyright permission on Copyright Marketplace
KEYWORDS
Laser communications
Telecommunications
Data communications
Satellites
Talc
Stanford Linear Collider
Free space optics
RELATED CONTENT
Subscribe to Digital Library
Receive Erratum Email Alert
Back to Top