PhD End-to-end Opto-thermo-mechanical Modelling

In the NWO-funded Perspective program Optical Wireless Superhighways, new perspectives can be opened for wireless communication which will offer unprecedented capacity, connection density, privacy, and energy efficiency. Five universities and a variety of knowledge Institutes and industries are joining forces to explore these opportunities at all length scales: ranging from ultra-long links between satellites, to short links within indoor rooms. We are looking for enthusiastic PhD students to join our program.

Effective and efficient transmitters and receivers of free space photons for communication require proper operation in their respective environment and face challenging conditions such as mechanical launch loads, radiation and rapidly changing thermal conditions. Therefore, the scientific challenge is to concurrently design the optical, thermo-mechanical and active optics systems using cutting-edge technological solutions in a harmonized bottom-up versus top-down system engineering (BU-TD SE) approach. Specifically, the scientific challenges are given by e.g. miniaturisation, enlarged aperture and stable thermo-mechanical performance in a harsh space environment. The project partners Airbus Defence Systems Netherlands(ADS-NL) and the Royal Netherlands Aerospace Center (NLR) have extensive experience e.g. in advanced structural and thermal modelling of space structures.

Besides Systems Engineering, a System-of-Systems approach is a necessity as well as a process to strictly control the BU-TD SE budget compliance. In this class the pointing of antennas and the stability of deployable structures like telescopes with segmented primary mirrors need to be aligned from micro- to nanometer-class precision in the dynamic space environment. This level of alignment cannot be achieved with solely deployment mechanisms. An active (optics) mechanism is required for such development and pushed by the development of innovative 3 degrees-of-freedom mechanisms. An advanced End-to-End Performance (EtEp) model of the opto-mechanical-thermal actuator system design is required. The research is strongly connected to refined breadboard designs enabling new iterations of the design to be quickly produced and evaluated. Moreover the SE space instrumentation and its terrestrial spin-offs focusses on a multi-application and cross-domain approach executed within a joint team at ADS-NL, the NLR and the faculty 3mE of the Delft University of Technology. The concurrent design engineering approach is focussed towards downscaling the technology and paving the way to cheap innovative applications within the space sector and the terrestrial domain. The main deliverables of the research are:

• Study of the thermo-mechanical-optical-elctronic (EtEp) system design
• Pushing critical TRL's to comply with the TD-BU SE budgets
• Design and optimization of the complete system
• Manufacturing and testing of critical miniaturization parts

To model the system and its components we will use our specialized (within the chair developed) software suite. Existing experience with ultra-low mechanical hysteresis, novel actuation and calibration approaches and optimization of phase diversity methods will be used.