Experimental Demonstration of an On-Axis Laser Ranging Interferometer for Future Gravity Missions
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arXiv
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| Auteurs principaux: | , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Preprint |
| Publié: |
2025
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| _version_ | 1866918449252401152 |
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| author | Wei, Daikang Bode, Christoph Yamamoto, Kohei Lee, Yongho Barranco, Germán Fernández Müller, Vitali Álvarez, Miguel Dovale Delgado, Juan José Esteban Heinzel, Gerhard |
| author_facet | Wei, Daikang Bode, Christoph Yamamoto, Kohei Lee, Yongho Barranco, Germán Fernández Müller, Vitali Álvarez, Miguel Dovale Delgado, Juan José Esteban Heinzel, Gerhard |
| contents | We experimentally demonstrate a novel interferometric architecture for next-generation gravity missions, featuring a laser ranging interferometer (LRI) that enables monoaxial transmission and reception of laser beams between two optical benches with a heterodyne frequency of 7.3 MHz. Active beam steering loops, utilizing differential wavefront sensing (DWS) signals, ensure co-alignment between the receiving (RX) beam and the transmitting (TX) beam. With spacecraft attitude jitter simulated by hexapod-driven rotations, the interferometric link achieves a pointing stability below 10 urad/$\mathrm{\sqrt{Hz}}$ in the frequency range between 0.2 mHz and 0.5 Hz, and the fluctuation of the TX beam's polarization state results in a reduction of 0.14\% in the carrier-to-noise-density ratio over a 15-hour continuous measurement. Additionally, tilt-to-length (TTL) coupling is experimentally investigated using the periodic scanning of the hexapod. Experimental results show that the on-axis LRI enables the inter-spacecraft ranging measurements with nanometer accuracy, making it a potential candidate for future GRACE-like missions. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2511_19533 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Experimental Demonstration of an On-Axis Laser Ranging Interferometer for Future Gravity Missions Wei, Daikang Bode, Christoph Yamamoto, Kohei Lee, Yongho Barranco, Germán Fernández Müller, Vitali Álvarez, Miguel Dovale Delgado, Juan José Esteban Heinzel, Gerhard Optics Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics Instrumentation and Detectors We experimentally demonstrate a novel interferometric architecture for next-generation gravity missions, featuring a laser ranging interferometer (LRI) that enables monoaxial transmission and reception of laser beams between two optical benches with a heterodyne frequency of 7.3 MHz. Active beam steering loops, utilizing differential wavefront sensing (DWS) signals, ensure co-alignment between the receiving (RX) beam and the transmitting (TX) beam. With spacecraft attitude jitter simulated by hexapod-driven rotations, the interferometric link achieves a pointing stability below 10 urad/$\mathrm{\sqrt{Hz}}$ in the frequency range between 0.2 mHz and 0.5 Hz, and the fluctuation of the TX beam's polarization state results in a reduction of 0.14\% in the carrier-to-noise-density ratio over a 15-hour continuous measurement. Additionally, tilt-to-length (TTL) coupling is experimentally investigated using the periodic scanning of the hexapod. Experimental results show that the on-axis LRI enables the inter-spacecraft ranging measurements with nanometer accuracy, making it a potential candidate for future GRACE-like missions. |
| title | Experimental Demonstration of an On-Axis Laser Ranging Interferometer for Future Gravity Missions |
| topic | Optics Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics Instrumentation and Detectors |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.19533 |