TeraNet aims to establish a three-node optical ground station network in Australia to support high-speed data downlinking from Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and beyond. The network is comprised of two 0.7m static ground stations situated at the University of Western Australia (UWA) and the Mingenew Space Precinct (300km north of UWA), and one 0.4m mobile ground station that will initially be commissioned at the European Space Agency’s Deep Space Network ground station in New Norcia (100km north of UWA). This network, strategically located with southern sky access and sharing a time zone with ⪆24% of the world’s population, will enhance global coverage and meet the evolving needs of international space missions. Additionally, the three-node architecture will offer unique opportunities to explore LEO line-of-sight handover during adverse weather conditions. Construction of this network has commenced, with two ground stations already on sky. We will present on our progress and preliminary results.
Aniket Hendre, Bassem Alachkar, Paul Boven, Songlin Chen, Hannah Collingwood, John Davis, Peter Dewdney, David Gozzard, Keith Grainge, Charles Gravestock, Yichen Guo, David Hindley, Maria Grazia Labate, Sascha Schediwy, Simon Stobie, Luca Stringhetti, Gerhard Swart, Bo Wang, Lijun Wang, Mark Waterson, Richard Whitaker, Althea Wilkinson
The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is a next-generation radio astronomy facility that will revolutionize our understanding of the Universe and the laws of fundamental physics. To achieve the intended objectives, it needs a stable reference frequency and accurate timing signals at each digitizer. These references are used for digitizing astronomical signals received from the receptors. The stability and accuracy of these references are highly important for coherently sampling the astronomical data. They are distributed using long-distance fibers that are susceptible to environmental perturbations, which makes meeting the requirements a challenge. The system overcomes these perturbations by actively stabilizing the noise during fiber transmission to achieve the required reference signal stability and sub-nanosecond level of timing accuracy. We collect together summary descriptions of the sub-systems designed for distributing the reference frequency and timing signals for each telescope, to provide an overview of the whole timing and frequency system for the SKA.
Next-generation radio telescopes, such as the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) and Next Generation Very Large Array (ngVLA), require precise microwave frequency reference signals to be transmitted over fiber links to each dish to coherently sample astronomical signals. Such telescopes employ phase stabilization systems to suppress the phase noise imparted on the reference signals by environmental perturbations on the links; however, the stabilization systems are bandwidth limited by the round-trip time of light traveling on the fiber links. A phase-locked receiver module (RM) is employed on each dish to suppress residual phase noise outside the round-trip bandwidth. The SKA RM must deliver a 3.96-GHz output signal with 4 MHz of tuning range and <100 fs of timing jitter. We present an RM architecture to meet both requirements. Analytical modeling of the RM predicts 30 fs of output jitter when the reference signal is integrated between 1 Hz and 2.8 GHz. The proposed RM was conceived with best practice electromagnetic compatibility in mind and to meet size, weight, and power requirements for the SKA dish indexer. As the ngVLA reference design also incorporates a round-trip phase stabilization system, this RM may be applicable to future ngVLA design.
Optical phased arrays (OPAs) are a solid-state device able to manipulate the distribution of optical power without the use of mechanical beam steering systems and have potential applications in free-space laser communications, target acquisition and tracking, and interferometry. Here we present a scalable OPA and digital control architecture capable of steering a laser beam at MHz frequencies, and having arbitrary control over the beam wavefront.
We present the preliminary design and experimental results of a 1550 nm solid-state beam pointing system based on an optical phased array (OPA) architecture. OPAs manipulate the distribution of optical power in the far-field by controlling the phase of individual emitters in an array. This allows OPAs to steer the beam in the far field without any mechanical components (e.g., steering mirrors). The beam-steering system presented here uses waveguide electro-optic modulators to actuate the phase of each element in a 7-emitter OPA, enabling kHz bandwidth steering with sub-milliradian pointing precision. The control system used to stabilize and control the phase of each emitter in the OPA exploits a technique called digitally enhanced heterodyne interferometry, allowing the phase of each emitter to be measured simultaneously at a single photodetector, dramatically simplifying the optical system. All digital signal processing is performed using a field-programmable gate-array. Applications of this technology include free-space link acquisition and tracking for satellite-to-satellite laser communications and light detection and ranging (LiDAR).
Access to the requested content is limited to institutions that have purchased or subscribe to SPIE eBooks.
You are receiving this notice because your organization may not have SPIE eBooks access.*
*Shibboleth/Open Athens users─please
sign in
to access your institution's subscriptions.
To obtain this item, you may purchase the complete book in print or electronic format on
SPIE.org.
INSTITUTIONAL Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.
PERSONAL Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.