Characterization of commercial fast steering mirrors for space application

Communication systems in space are looking with interest to optical solutions, thanks to the advantages with respect to radiofrequency methods, mainly in terms of available bandwidth. In order to be effective, optical communication requires high pointing stability, facing disturbances like atmosphere turbulences or mechanical vibration coming from the working environment. This work wants to assess performance of off-the-shelf fast steering mirrors to be used for jitter suppression in optical communication system. The selected fast steering mirrors have been characterized and two controllers have been developed and compared in terms of achievable performances in rejecting mechanical disturbances.