The Optoelectronics Laboratory, together with the Laboratorio de Antenas and the Instituto de Física (IFIS) at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, are developing low-cost adaptive optics solutions for ultra-fast and highly secure communications.
COMMTRUE – Optical Communications Through the Atmosphere is one of the five winning projects of the 2025 Centenario Research Competition. The proposal, funded by the university’s Dirección de Investigación, received US $42k and has a duration of one year.
COMMTRUE is an interdisciplinary project involving researchers from the Escuela de Ingeniería Eléctrica (EIE) and IFIS at PUCV. Backed by the Vicerrectoría de Investigación, Creación e Innovación (VINCI), the project aims to strengthen highly competitive research teams to promote future applications to major national science programs such as ANID’s Anillo or Millennium Nucleus initiatives.
Led by Dr. Esteban Vera, faculty member at EIE and director of the Optoelectronics Laboratory, the project focuses on developing novel adaptive optics techniques based on artificial intelligence (AI) to characterize atmospheric turbulence, which is responsible for deflecting light as it travels through the air.
This major challenge aims to improve one of the most promising, cutting-edge, and efficient communication systems of the future: free-space and laser satellite communications.
Contributing to the Technological Advancement of Future Connectivity
Laser-based connectivity enables high-speed data exchange at rates far exceeding traditional radio-frequency systems. However, horizontal atmospheric turbulence—present between two ground points—severely distorts light propagation, causing significant transmission interference in optical communication links.
Regarding this, Dr. Vera explains:
“We’ve developed proprietary technologies to model and compensate for atmospheric turbulence that distorts light, in order to improve the bandwidth of the communication channel.”
The project team is composed of:
- Dr. Esteban Vera (EIE) – Project lead and expert in adaptive optics, instrumentation, and AI
- Dr. Darío Pérez (IFIS) – Deputy director in charge of atmospheric turbulence and optical instrumentation
- Dr. Francisco Pizarro (EIE) – Specialist in communications and antenna systems
- Dr. Mónica García (IFIS) – Expert in characterization and modeling of nonlinear physical systems
The project also includes international collaborators from the University of Tokyo, the Laboratoire d’Astrophysique de Marseille, and ONERA in France.
In addition to designing novel optical systems and nonlinear models for atmospheric characterization, the main objective of COMMTRUE is to experimentally validate the proposed methods through a 55 km optical communication link between the SPOXC Space Observatory and Cerro El Roble.
If successfully implemented, this would become the longest optical communication link in Latin America, exceeding by up to five times the length of similar experiments reported worldwide. Beyond contributing to the scientific community, this initiative has the potential to strengthen PUCV’s research trajectory, technological capabilities, and human capital.
“In recent years, we’ve been building the SPOXC space observatory in Curauma, and we now have the ground-based infrastructure to establish this link. This project is a major opportunity to consolidate our team, gain international recognition, and continue growing as an observatory,” adds Dr. Vera.
COMMTRUE is a bold and promising initiative with the potential to contribute internationally to the advancement of free-space and satellite communications, through the development of compact, low-cost technological solutions.