Performance analysis of inter-satellite optical wireless communication (IsOWC) system at 980 nm and 1550 nm wavelengths

Abstract

Free space optical communication provides a unique method for the satellites orbiting around the earth to communication with each other. Inter-satellite optical wireless communication systems (IsOWC), one of the important applications of Free space optical communication technology, will be deployed in space in the near future as such systems provide a high bandwidth, small size, light weight, low power and low cost alternative to present microwave satellite systems. In this paper, optical inter-satellite link (ISL) is modeled using optisystem and then investigation is carried out to study the effect of varying the wavelength between two satellites estranged by a distance of 1300 km at data rate 3 Gbps. In this paper the performance of the IsOWC link is evaluated keeping into consideration the pointing errors.