Jan 25 2011
ODIS has secured a development contract from NASA that will comprise a Phase I Award of $100,000. NASA has selected ODIS' PlanarOptoElectric Technology (POET) platform as an ideal procedure to build Optoelectronic infrastructure for Optical/RF phased array sensors.
Next -generation sensors in space need both mmw (millimeter wave) sensing at 35 GHz and optical sensing at 1.5 µm. Usually, separate emitting openings are needed for the RF and optical operations. ODIS will create the POET to merge the optical and RF beams for phased array sensors into a single monolithic circuit, with every circuit offering a pixel of the RF array.
The POET will also offer on-chip electronic control of both optical and RF beam steering angles. A huge number of similar spacecraft sensors will be installed in extended space missions which, results in the eradication of power and weight as well as the enhancement in durability.
President of ODIS, Leon M. Pierhal, commented that small electronically monitored phased array sensors with combined optical and RF emission have huge commercial market in aviation, security and free space optics communication industries. These active sensors are complementing the conventional visible and IR imagers, he added.
Source: http://www.opelinc.com