Demonstration of lasercom and spatial tracking with a silicon Geiger-mode APD array

Timothy M. Yarnall; Benjamin W. Horkley; Ajay S. Garg; Scott A. Hamilton

doi:10.1117/12.2219895

15 March 2016 Demonstration of lasercom and spatial tracking with a silicon Geiger-mode APD array

Timothy M. Yarnall, Benjamin W. Horkley, Ajay S. Garg, Scott A. Hamilton

Proceedings Volume 9739, Free-Space Laser Communication and Atmospheric Propagation XXVIII; 97390N (2016) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2219895
Event: SPIE LASE, 2016, San Francisco, California, United States

Abstract

We present a demonstration of a high-rate photon counting receiver with the potential to act as a spatial tracker based on a silicon Geiger-mode avalanche photodiode array (GM-APD). This array enables sensitive high-rate optical communication in the visible and near infrared regions of the spectrum. The array contains 1024 elements arranged in a 32x32 pixel square. This large number of elements supports high data rates through the mitigation of blocking losses and associated data rate limitations created by the reset time of an individual Geiger-mode detector. Measurement of bit error rates demonstrate that receiver sensitivities of 2.55 dB (detected) photons-per-bit for 78.8 Mb/s on-off-keying and -0.46 dB (detected) photons-per-bit for 19.4 Mb/s 16-ary pulse-position modulation are accessible with strong forward error correction. Additionally, the array can record the spatial coordinates of each detection event. By computing the centroid of the distribution of spatial detections it is possible to determine the angle-of-arrival of the detected photons. These levels of performance imply that Si GM-APD arrays are excellent candidates for a variety of free space lasercom applications ranging from atmospheric communication in the 1 micron or 780 nm spectral windows to underwater communication in the 480 nm to 520 nm spectral window

Citation Download Citation

Timothy M. Yarnall, Benjamin W. Horkley, Ajay S. Garg, and Scott A. Hamilton "Demonstration of lasercom and spatial tracking with a silicon Geiger-mode APD array", Proc. SPIE 9739, Free-Space Laser Communication and Atmospheric Propagation XXVIII, 97390N (15 March 2016); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2219895

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

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.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available