Telecoms could benefit from Orion’s first patented technology

When our research has the potential to impact on industry more widely, we use patents as a means of sharing the benefits of technological innovations.

In December 2021, Physicists David Hillier and David Winter were granted a patent for a technology they originally developed for the Orion laser facility to help it accurately measure signals from a range of beamlines.

Signal strengths can vary from high to lows, and this patent for a “Method and Device for Measuring A Pulse Signal with High Dynamic Range” includes a novel device that replicates a signal so it can be measured across a wide range of levels – known as a high dynamic range.

Hillier explains, “There are a few quirks about Orion that make it tricky to take all the measurements we need. The way we’re set up makes our focal spot evolve slightly throughout the day and we are also constantly changing the laser’s parameters to deliver the huge range of experiments that Orion can field.”

Technology development is always an iterative process, and Winter told us about some of the considerations he had to make while developing the pulse replicator.

“We looked at options for an active device with fibre loops and amplifiers, but that would need maintaining, setting up, and optimisation – that’s extra time and almost always more expensive! We needed something cheaper, easily buildable, and more compact so it fits within all the systems we have at Orion.”

After a series of trial and error, the team finally had their eureka moment in 2018, and the pulse replicator device was installed and used on the Orion Laser from 2019 onwards.

The ability to measure signals across a high dynamic range is a problem for many other industries where signal strength can vary significantly. When Hillier and Winter were developing this device for Orion, they realised it could be used to help other fields as well.

“In parallel, we realised because it was something we couldn’t just buy off the market and because of the amount of the support we had to build this device, we had to patent it and share it with others. It’s a problem that’s applicable to a range of fields, and we couldn’t really find a good solution,” said Hillier.

Patenting technology is a good way of sharing research from AWE so the wider industry can benefit from its potential through licences. At AWE, we collaborate with Ploughshare and Defence Intellectual Property Rights (DIPR) to commercialise technologies developed here.

“It’s very interesting going through the process with Ploughshare and getting exposure to different people and different ways of thinking about the world,” Hillier told us. “It’s not a thing scientists think to do – we think about publishing papers, not to patent and commercialise ideas. This is the first commercialisation coming from Orion, and I’m glad the patenting process is becoming smoother.”

Winter and Hillier are now working closely with Ploughshare to explore how this technology could be used across different applications, like telecommunications, LiDAR and other remote sensing fields.

 Marie Thirlwall, VP of Digital Commercialisation at Ploughshare, explains: “Ploughshare is the MOD’s route to commercialising its knowledge assets. As such, we have the privilege of working alongside our country’s best scientists and engineers to help get their innovations into the hands of users. Laser technology proliferates our daily lives across a wide range of consumer and business applications. This innovation presents an exciting step forward for industries such as telecommunications, remote sensing, and connected autonomous vehicles, and we are keen to engage with organisations that would benefit from this inspiring innovation from AWE.”

 More about Ploughshare and our Rewards for Innovators programme can be found here: Fostering Innovation at AWE

Read about our Orion laser here.

To find out about the commercialisation opportunity for this technology, please see the Ploughshare website.