Free-Space Laser Communications

Leading experts bring together in this book the most recent results from the emerging area of free-space laser communications where the interest, need, challenge and attention continue to grow. This book is designed to provide a comprehensive, unified tutorial that will further the readers understanding of the fundamental techniques of free-space laser communications. With the unprecedented growth of the Internet and related data services, and the creation of new multimedia technologies everyday, the reader has a genuine need for a book that can help him or her to bridge the gaps between fundamental principles of laser communications, systems design, and performance analysis, while keeping up with emerging technologies as they begin to be applied in this field. §§This comprehensive book will provide inquisitive readers the necessary information about the basics of free-space laser communications, as well as up-to-date knowledge of the state-of-the-art technologies available today, and how to use them to meet their needs in the most practical way. Each chapter contains information concerning the fundamentals, research and current developments in a given area, and will provide the reader with knowledge that spans the basic conceptual principles up to the most technically advanced developments. This is the first book of its kind containing the chapters which cover a wide range of diverse but relevant topics addressing the issues of free-space laser communications. Some of the areas include: Free-space laser communication performance in atmospheric channel, Extremely high sensitive state-of-the-art receiver design and performance for high data rate communications, Communication Techniques and Coding for Atmospheric Turbulence Channels, Free-space laser communications with Adaptive Optics: Atmospheric compensation experiments, Optical Networks, Last Mile Access and Applications, Longer wavelength Optical Communications (Mid-wave IR, Quantum Cascade laser-based and long-wavelength IR).