<title>Underwater Optical Communications Receivers</title>

Abstract

When an optical receiver is to operate underwater and detect a signal from a point optical source located at altitude above the water, unusual design constraints are imposed by the underwater environment. The effect of the propagation medium on a deeply submerged optical receiver is examined. Design features are optimized for background limited operation. Important and useful relationships are developed comparing the aperture area and optical filter bandwidths achieveable in telecentric and conventional optical designs. It is shown that telecentric optical configurations can provide improved system performance if the receiver field-of-view must be larger than ± 32 degrees.