The project has for target to demonstrate the feasibility of an antenna with a large number of beams in Ka band, for the civil and military telecommunications. This need is clearly identified for the multimedia systems, in the objective to increase their capacity. A multispot antenna affords a better robustness to jamming on the theatres of operations, and is thus very attractive for the military telecommunications. Very directive spots are achieved with a very big antenna aperture. The reflector maximal diameter in Europe is 2.4*3,6 m2. A solution with a foldable reflectarray antenna is being developed in Thales Alenia Space. It is envisaged at the moment only for the low frequency bands (L, S, C). This antenna is ideal for the sizes included between 4m and 8m. It is an alternative solution of the big American Mesh reflectors, while requiring much lower development costs. The rise in frequency of the big radiating apertures induces manufacturing accuracy and thermo-elastics issues, which affect the quality of the beams. The disruptive concept proposed here consists in using this big radiating aperture in a new configuration, an Imaging Array. The Imaging Array is made of two confocal reflectors, one very big, the other smaller. This optical subsystem magnifies a primary phased array. With such an architecture, it becomes possible to clear for the effects of the static and dynamic deformations by means of phase shifters placed at the level of the focal array. The demonstration of this feasibility constitutes the first objective of this project. It will be applied to the particular case of a large reflectarray. The second critical point of such an antenna subsystem lies in the Beam Forming Network (BFN). An innovative approach, free of anteriority in intellectual property, is developed at the Institute of Electronics and Telecommunications of Rennes ( IETR). It concerns a BFN referred to as a "Pill-Box". We suggest performing in this project the first demonstration of such a Pillbox BFN in two dimensions. The concept is moreover original and a joint patent registration IETR / TAS is currently being developed. This experimental demonstration, associated with the optimal dimensioning of the architecture antenna, and in the demonstration of the possibility of clearing for the shape imperfections of a large reflectarray will show the feasibility of such an antenna subsystem. This project will allow to remove both critical points identified for such an antenna. It will open considerable perspectives because the aimed product corresponds to a priority need for telecommunications civil and military operators.

The aim of the PRISMS project is to develop a tool for modelling and predicting the effects on the Earth's ionized environment of electromagnetic emissions and particle ejection from the Sun. Through the PRISMS project, we ambition, by coupling individually validated models, to build an integrated model that will be able to propagate electromagnetic emissions from the Sun and plasma emissions from the solar wind, at the L1 Lagrange point, to the ionized space environment of Earth, with coupling functions adapted to ensure the delicate transmission at the interface between the solar wind and the terrestrial environment. This global model will be constrained by space observations, which will condition the coupling functions in order to better characterize the perturbation and its propagation. The model will evaluate the effects on the ionosphere dynamics of electromagnetic disturbances during solar flares and the effects associated with magnetic storms (corotating interaction regions and coronal mass ejections) and thereby the impact on radio communications through the propagation of electromagnetic waves in this environment. In addition, by developing a suitable module, the model will calculate the ground magnetic trace of these disturbances. At the end of the project, we will have implemented a prototype operational system that will have the ability to follow in near real-time the variations of electromagnetic solar emissions and of thje properties from the solar wind and to describe the disturbances induced by solar activity on the propagation of radio waves. This effort is part of a strategy of national independence with respect to modeling of the damaging effects of the Sun on the industrial, societal and military activities in France and more broadly on an European level.

L'objectif global est d'améliorer les méthodes de gestion du trafic, en utilisant d'une part les données actuellement disponibles, et d'autre part les informations pouvant provenir de véhicules traceurs, afin d'obtenir une meilleure connaissance en temps réel des situations de trafic à l'échelle de l'agglomération et être en mesure de diffuser de l'information dynamique aux usagers.

Today, information systems are one of the world's main resources. As accentuated by the Covid-19 crisis, our society relies on an ever-increasing need to process and communicate data, with significant repercussions on politics, defense, health, innovation, daily-life and the economy. The level of security remains a major issue for many use-cases, where secret key encryption are provably secure and can be implemented in the real world via quantum solutions. Quantum-safe communication, the first commercially available quantum technology, provides a unique means to establish, between distant locations, random strings of identical secret bits, with a level of security unattainable using conventional approaches. The implementation of actual quantum systems has become crucial, given the strong military, societal and economic impacts. This path, considered as one of the most promising for IT innovation, benefits from largely endowed R&D programs, such as the EU Flagship and other national initiatives (UK, Germany, China, USA, France). With the development of quantum computers and sensors, it becomes of prime necessity to connect them. Consequently, tasks such as distributed quantum computing and sensing will lead to a large-scale quantum Internet. The major obstacle to the adoption of such networks lies in the limited distance (~100 km) over which they can be deployed, due to losses in optical fibers and the curvature of the Earth. In the absence of reliable quantum repeaters, the space segment represents the only potential way to circumvent this limitation. To date, the only real demonstrations have been made in China (Micius satellite), but many projects are underway at the international scale. SoLuQS aims at effectively answering this demand by building industrial "entanglement source" prototypes that meet the constraints of spatialization, without compromising their performance. The key words of our achievements will be compactness and integrability, allowing satellite exploitation for both civil and military domains. These devices will eventually allow the connection of 2 metropolitan quantum networks (Paris and Nice). SoLuQS will therefore follow the promising path of new telecom-compatible laser optical communication systems in free space, and is thus part of the ASTRID AAP's thematic axis 3, "Cryptography - Communication", with a focus on "network security", their "operational implementation" based on "multimodal entanglement", as well as "space solutions". We will develop, at the French scale, the necessary tools for spatialization, in view of establishing a secure space/ground communication link, in order to anticipate future satellite realizations. SoLuQS brings together the best international teams in quantum communication (INPHYNI and LIP6) as well as a major French space industrial group (Thales Alenia Space) which will promote both integration and spatialization of the achievements. The consortium will pursue an active knowledge dissemination strategy. IP and the attraction of industrialists have a directly exploitable economic value, both in terms of patents, market reach, and creation of start-ups. We will ensure the training of staff and students as well as the promotion of partners in both the academic and industrial communities. These activities will be complemented by dissemination actions (international conferences, scientific and general public publications, etc.) in order to maximize the project impact. Taken as a whole, our actions will ensure France to play a leading role on the international level, in terms of disruptive quantum technologies for space quantum communication.

The objective of the CalQ project is to demonstrate mid infrared atmospheric communications using a key-distribution relying on a pure deterministic process. In order to do so, the secret message will be encoded into a chaotic signal generated by a quantum cascade laser and then will be retrieved via quantum cascade detectors. Chaos is typically associated to rich and intrinsic oscillations, which can take place into a laser medium. The birth of the instabilities in a laser can lead to temporal and/or spatial chaotic dynamics, which must be distinguished from pure stochastic processes related to noise contributions. Encoded communications using diode laser chaos is a very well-known technology that has been widely used in the near infrared (telecoms) domain but that has never ever been applied to the mid infrared window. In order to make a free-space communication, the choice of the wavelength is of paramount importance that depends on the atmospheric transmission and the aerosol diffusion. Typically, wavelengths below the 8-12µm band strongly suffer from diffusion processes (clouds, fogs, etc.) while larger wavelengths get absorbed up to the microwave domain. Taking into account all these elements, it turns out that the most conducive spectral window is the 8-12 µm band. As a consequence of that, the project will perform the first ever secured transmission in this atmospheric transmission band by utilizing the chaotic dynamic outputted from a quantum cascade laser. The first observation of a chaotic dynamic in a quantum cascade laser was performed in the initial project (PhD thesis of Louise Jumpertz entirely funded by the DGA). All these elements make the CaLQ project strongly innovating. In addition to the proof of concept itself, the project will investigate/study the global problematic of the chaotic communications in the mid infrared window as well as identifying the key mechanisms and parameters. The project relies on a solid consortium with well-known experts in the different fields and having an excellent complementarity. TPT is in charge of the management of the project as well as the realization of the free-space communication system based on the chaotic regime from the quantum cascade laser. In order to do so, the two required building blocks will be developed by MIRS for the laser part and by the III-V Lab for the detection one. TAS will bring his strong expertise in the design of the chaotic communication system and in the final validation. The technology developed in the CaLQ project is of first importance for various applications both at the civil and defense levels. The results will feed the development of secured and furtive communications on landscapes without any infrastructures. If the system is enough compact and energy efficient, its deployment between airborne or space objects and the ground or terrestrial communication between two ground stations is envisioned with the view to create a secured communication network. High-speed communications are of paramount importance especially for applications requiring a fast transmission speed like between a drone and its base station.