Influence of misalignment and aberrations on antenna received power in free-space laser communications

Abstract

To evaluate the influence of wavefront aberrations on antenna received power in free-space laser communications, an aberration attenuation factor is proposed, based on which the power penalty at the receiver due to misalignment and primary aberrations is investigated. It is shown that antenna received power decreases gradually with increasing misalignment and aberrations. A comparison shows that tilt ͑misalign-ment͒ has greater influence than other primary aberrations. When the rms aberration value is 0.1, the received power penalties caused by tilt, astigmatism, coma, curvature, and spherical aberrations are about 40%, 36%, 35%, 24%, and 23%, respectively. In addition, the obscuration ratio of the transmitter antenna has a noticeable but relatively minor influence on the aberration attenuation factor.