Amplitude fluctuations for optical waves propagation through non-Kolmogorov coronal solar wind turbulence channels.

Abstract

Optical communication has a great potential for the future deep space communication, while the amplitude fluctuations caused by the coronal solar wind irregularities has been a challenging topic during superior solar conjunction. In this paper, a closed-form amplitude fluctuations expression for optical waves propagation through non-Kolmogorov solar wind turbulence is derived by establishing a generalized coronal turbulence spectrum model. The profound impact of the coronal parameters on the bit error rate (BER) performance of the free space optical system is also investigated based on the derived amplitude fluctuations model. The derived expression allows easy analysis of the evolution of the amplitude fluctuations and, in particular, an understanding of the imposed effects caused by the parameters during the waves propagation. The combined effect of the optical wavelength, non-Kolmogorov spectral index, turbulence outer scale, relative solar wind density fluctuation factor, and link distance on amplitude fluctuations are evaluated. Numerical calculations show that these parameters produce obvious effects on the amplitude fluctuations and the BER. The large optical wavelength can mitigate the influence of the coronal turbulence. Our results have potential applications for evaluating the link performance of the future deep space communication.