Beyond Line of Sight Video Delivery System

The U.S. Army needs to transmit video more than 60 nautical miles from rotary wing aircraft at altitudes of upto 4,000 ft. At present, video transmission range is limited by high transmission bandwidth requirements, insufficient encryption, and theinability to operate large numbers of networked airborne sensor platforms in the same physical space. The Phase I research showed that the Army needs for beyond-line-of-sight (BLOS) video transmission can be met by wavelet-based video compression withunique adaptive wavelet quantization combined with efficient code division multiple access (CDMA) communication hardware Tunable Data Rate (TUNDRA) compression and communication. Its key strength is the ability to dynamically adapt transmission data rateto communication channel quality through adaptive video compression. In Phase II Physical Optics Corporation (POC) will develop a novel BLOS video delivery system that can for the first time transmit RS-170 and EIA-343A streaming video at high dynamicrange, in 10-bit black and white or 24-bit color at 30 frames per second with minimum latency, and making the most efficient use of available communication bandwidth. Digitally transmitted compressed video will significantly improve quality over that ofanalog. TUNDRA low power operation, light weight, and ease of use will make it commercially attractive.The TUNDRA system will drastically improve U.S. Army surveillance, reconnaissance, and BDA capabilities. It will bring new wireless video communicationcapability to soldiers. The TUNDRA system is a good match to commercial markets for telemedicine, robotics, teleconferencing, and entertainment. POC has been successfully commercializing technologies initiated under SBIR programs through joint ventures,OEMs, and spin-offs and will apply the same strategy to TUNDRA commercialization.