MRI: Acquisition of Equipment to Support Lightwave and Microwave Research

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We propose an equipment grant to enhance ongoing and future lightwave communications andradar remote sensing research and education at the University of Kansas. The instrumentationwe propose to acquire includes various lightwave components, a network analyzer, a portablespectrum analyzer, two arbitrary waveform generators, a high-speed data acquisition system, anda high-speed oscilloscope. The lightwave components includes lasers with integrated electro-absorptionmodulators, high-power erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFA), a semiconductoroptical amplifier (SOA), a 35-GHz photo receiver with amplifier, fiber-optic delay lines, opticalsplitters/combiners, an extended DWDM-band tunable laser, and pump laser diodes for a Ramanamplifier.We propose to use the lightwave equipment to upgrade our 10 Gb/s test beds to 40 Gb/s tosupport ongoing and future research activities. We will use the high-speed oscilloscope andspectrum analyzer for testing and calibrating our existing radars as well as the new ones beingdeveloped for glacial ice studies and as prototypes for Mars observation. We will use thearbitrary waveform generators as flexible signal sources to support activities related to ongoingefforts on the development of a pulse-compression LIDAR and also investigating optimizedwaveforms for various remote sensing applications. We propose to use the network analyzerprimarily as a dedicated source and receiver for our antenna testing range, which is needed tosupport our radar development activities.In lightwave communications research, the 40 Gb/s per optical channel is the next signaling rateto be deployed to meet society's insatiable communication needs. Extensive experimentaltesting is required to study and evaluate the many questions critical to the implementation of thissignaling rate. The proposed upgrades to our testbed will allow us to evaluate the performanceof components, subsystems, and systems at this signaling rate. To launch and then detect40 Gb/s signals for system evaluation, short-pulse lasers, power dividers and combiners, andwide-bandwidth photodetectors are needed. In addition, to manage fiber nonlinearities for theseincreased signaling rates, distributed signal amplification with Raman amplifiers will need to beemployed.Three ongoing projects in remote sensing will benefit significantly from the proposed testequipment: (1) measurement of ice thickness and accumulation rate over the Greenland ice sheet;(2) design and development of a radar prototype for Mars; and (3) design and development of apulse compression LIDAR for a future satellite mission. The test equipment will allow us toimprove our existing coherent radar depth sounder for obtaining ice thickness data over a fewoutlet glaciers that are thinning and for which no ice thickness data are available. The icethickness data are essential to the study of the dynamics of these glaciers. The Mars radardevelopment involves design tradeoffs in modulation waveform, frequency, sidelobe levels, andantenna size. The test equipment will contribute to testing and evaluating an optimizedprototype radar for a future Mars lander or/and orbiter, as well as investigating the use of single-sidebandmodulation techniques to improve the sensitivity of our pulse compression LIDAR.Currently 17 graduate students, seven undergraduate students, two post-doctoral researchengineers, and five faculty are involved in the ongoing research projects. We anticipate similarnumbers of students and research associates to be involved in future lightwave communicationsand remote sensing research at this institution. Thus the proposed equipment is a significantcontribution to the research and education mission of the University of Kansas.