The effectiveness of free-space laser communications is limited due to wavefront deformations caused by atmospheric optical turbulence. To measure these deformations, we propose using a wavefront sensor that utilizes the angular selectivity of an optical transmission filter. This sensor converts phase gradients into an intensity distribution. This distribution is captured twice for each direction ( x and y ). The contrast of these two measurements (calculated for each pixel of the detector used) is linearly related to the local wavefront gradient. We use algorithms developed for the Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor to reconstruct the wavefront from the obtained local gradients. Simulations demonstrate the applicability of the sensor in atmospheric turbulence.
Zepp et al. (Wed,) studied this question.