Study On Non-mechanical Flexible Beam Servo Control Technology

A significant amount of attention has been given to the over all problems of the acquisition, pointing and tracking (APT) of satellites in the area of free space laser communications. The traditional mechanical beam servo control technology can't meet the requirements of the evolution of space laser communications which includes minimal investment in hardware size, weight, and power because of its own disadvantages in the bulky, power-hungry, low-bandwidth, the while non-mechanical beam steering device can. The study of non-mechanical beam steering device focuses on liquid crystal technology and acoustic-optical technology currently.The author argues that these two techniques are emerging and cutting-edge and tries to apply them to different subsystem in APT system. According to the difference between them and the theoretical analysis, the passage is of opinion that liquid crystal phased array technology and acousto-optic deflection technology has obvious advantages and disadvantages. Though they are promising future technologies, they also needs to be improved.