Non-Mechanical Beam Steering for Entry, Descent and Landing Sensors

Boulder Nonlinear Systems (BNS) and University of Dayton (UD) will team on development of a non-mechanical beam steering (NMBS) subsystem for Entry, Descent and Landing (EDL) sensors. BNS will improve their current polarization grating (PG) technology which is capable of switching well over the +- 25 degree requirement called for in the solicitation. Advances to the PG technology specific to the NASA EDL application will include improved throughput, and significant weight reduction by combining components and drastically reducing substrate thicknesses. In addition BNS and UD will develop an environmental test plan tailored to an EDL mission. The PG technology is a coarse steering technology and a NMBS system employing it would be improved by adding fine angle continuous steering capability. UD will leverage its Electro-optic (EO) Crystal center and investigate continuous fine steering based on EO crystals. In addition UD will also tap into its LADAR expertise at the LADAR and Optical Communications Institute (LOCI) to provide systems level analysis to design a NMBS prototype which will be built in Phase II.

A low-SWaP beam control system could be used in many of NASA's remote sensing applications including meteorological studies and agricultural or environmental surveys in addition to the entry descent and landing application. The result of the Phase I effort will be a design for a prototype low SWaP beam control system. The Phase II prototype implementation will serve to demonstrate the beam control capability, environmental survivability, as well as optimize size, weight and power. The resultant beam control system will be transitioned into a commercial product.

Possible commercial applications include the use of this technology for agricultural and meteorological information gathering as well as search and rescue.

This is early/mid-stage (TRL 3) — the most realistic path in is NASA SBIR/STTR, which funds small businesses and research institutions to develop technology aligned with NASA's needs (equity-free, phased funding). Check whether a current SBIR/STTR solicitation topic overlaps with this project's technology area, or contact the project directly (above) to ask.

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