Image Based Acquisition and Tracking for Multi-Access Laser Communications

Long-range laser communications links offer many potential advantages to satellite communications systems including high bandwidth, security, and a small physical footprint. However, the establishment of a laser communications link can be very difficult and time consuming due to the extremely small beam divergences and stringent platform stability requirements inherent to lasercom systems. Most of the difficulty lies in the first step of actually painting the partner terminal with a laser spot or detecting said spot due to large uncertainties, terminal vibrations and jitter, bright optical backgrounds and clutter. A detailed physical and statistical model of this first detection process has been developed and verified against computer simulations using representative background images to ensure the success of this critical first step in the acquisition process, enabling future designers to have some confidence that their terminals will be able to acquire