UK university gets £5M to strap lasers to CubeSats
- Reference: 1689328985
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2023/07/14/northumbria_uni_cubesat_lasers/
- Source link:
The education institute has been granted a £5 million ($6.5 million) award from the [1]UK Space Agency to develop a new laser-based optical satellite communications system designed with miniature [2]CubeSats in mind. If all goes well, the technology will be ready for launch in 2025.
Lasers for drone communications are marvelous – almost impossible to jam, and very hard to detect, so the military are very interested in getting directional lasers onto drones
Scientists at the university's Space Technology Laboratory have been working with partners such as Durham University, satellite comms specialists e2E, and SMS Electronics to develop the project, and have now been joined by global aerospace company Lockheed Martin, which will be leading the system's engineering development.
The university said that thanks to existing funding, it has been able to establish the working principles for a prototype of a compact, high-speed inter-satellite laser optical communication device.
Lasers can transmit 1,000 times more data per second than using radio channels and because they are highly directional, it is also possible to transmit much more securely. It is hoped that such laser-based devices will become the predominant communications mechanism for satellites in future.
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Professor Robert Wicks, head of the Space Technology Laboratory, said that the team is now ready for the next stage to build and test of a pair of prototype CubeSats that will be ready to launch to space in 2025, "but will also be ready for sale as the UK's first commercially available laser communication device for small satellites."
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Gartner VP analyst Bill Ray told us that there are already various laser systems already in use for communications between orbiting satellites, but that existing systems are pretty heavy.
[6]Japan schedules August launch for 'Moon Sniper' lander
[7]Uncle Sam wants DEF CON hackers to pwn this Moonlighter satellite in space
[8]After network glitch, South Korea's commercial sat-slinger succeeds
[9]NASA freezes ice-hunting cubesat Moon mission for good after thruster fail
"Tesat's system is 56kg, with the moving mirrors and so forth, so if they can make something smaller and lighter, then there will be a good market for it, and not just in satellites," Ray said. "Lasers for drone communications are marvelous – almost impossible to jam, and very hard to detect, so the military are very interested in getting directional lasers onto drones," he added.
Meanwhile, other things are afoot in the satellite industry. The European Space Agency (ESA) and mobile network body the GSMA this week signed a Memorandum of Intent (MOI) to work together on integrating satellite communications with 5G and future 6G networks.
Key to this will apparently be the GSMA Foundry, which focuses on new technology projects. It will work with ESA's 5G/6G Hub based in Oxfordshire on how to integrate 5G and 6G communications with non-terrestrial networks.
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It isn't entirely clear what form this integration will take, but there is already [11]some support for non-terrestrial networks integrated into handsets already on sale.
"Collaboration is key to telecommunications innovation," said ESA's Head of Space for 5G and 6G Strategic Program, Antonio Franchi, adding: "We look forward to working with GSMA to explore and realize the huge potential of next-generation satellite-enabled connectivity." ®
Get our [12]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/uk-space-agency
[2] https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cubesats/overview
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZLFxKRiFlqWPaxGQEJyOxAAAAxQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZLFxKRiFlqWPaxGQEJyOxAAAAxQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZLFxKRiFlqWPaxGQEJyOxAAAAxQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/12/jaxa_slim_xrism_august_launch/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2023/06/03/moonlighter_satellite_hacking/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2023/05/26/south_korea_nuri_launch_success/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/05/15/nasa_lunar_flashlight_mission_abandoned/
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZLFxKRiFlqWPaxGQEJyOxAAAAxQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2023/01/06/qualcomm_bullitt_unveil_satellite_messaging/
[12] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Free air laser comms in a small (hopefully cheap?) package - Yes Please
If they are useable for drones there are sorts of other places where smaller - and especially cheaper - free air laser comms could be useful.
Although the real question would be, how resistant could these devices be to collecting muck in day to day use? You rarely get a good smog in space and military drones can be packaged in a "tear off protective cover before use, good for two flights" package.
For example, network traffic between rail carriages without faffing when coupling. Similarly, rail to station network. Short range (presumably), high traffic, boat to boat, boat to shore.
All those clever ideas for self-driving cars that communicate between themselves for driving as a pack: go direct instead of the mooted 5G connections (5G, modulated parking radar and semaphore as backup).
Re: Free air laser comms in a small (hopefully cheap?) package - Yes Please
>>>collecting muck in day to day use<<<
screen wash & wipers are already invented - triggered when the error rate is high enough to matter?
Re: Free air laser comms in a small (hopefully cheap?) package - Yes Please
> screen wash & wipers are already invented
As are the scratches from the wipers moving in the same way every time. Nice fine scratches and laser light - oooh, look at the pretty diffraction patterns.
Maybe the emitter window is really funky stuff and way too expensive to make in a sheet large enough to bond into environmental casing and putting it behind a window causes problems of its own (e.g reflections)? Optical issues like those can be solved *but* maybe at too high a cost to make it worth bothering.
So you still have to check whether there is anything that an cause issues with "the obvious solution", hence why I put it in.
The same goes for every other part of putting a doodad into a new use case: can you make it work at a cost we like? Didn't think I would have to spell that out.
Finally..
Real lasers properly small enough for sharks :).
Have a nice weekend, all.
Meanwhile in another land far away a University researchers are awarded a billion (insert currency name) to develop a system to jam laser communications.