Patent ID: 8301032

Claim:
A system for remote communication and data monitoring, comprising: a base station and a remote station, said base station comprising transmitter-receiver means to transmit an interrogation optical beam to said remote station, and a receiver at said base station to detect the returned signal from the said remote station; said remote station comprising: receiving optics including a wide-angle large format telecentric lens coupled to an input lenslet array, the input lenslet array further coupled to an array of single mode fibers that accept return light received from the interrogator, each single mode fiber of the array of single mode fibers including a single mode fiber tap and each single mode fiber tap coupled to a separate photodetector and electronics, whereby said electronics are used to identify the single mode fiber in said single mode fiber array that receives a return signal with the highest intensity, the single mode fiber array further coupled to an optical amplifier to amplify the return signal, and the amplifier further coupled to a return signal modulator; transmit exit optics including a wide-angle telecentric lens to retro-reflect back to the interrogator location the amplified and modulated return signal exiting from a spatial router fiber element that corresponds to the input lenslet array element with the highest received signal, said transmitting exit optics co-aligned with the input lenslet array and coupled to an output array of single mode fibers so that there is a one-to-one correspondence between the direction of reception and transmission; and a spatial router control device including electronics to switch said single mode fiber spatial router to a specific single mode fiber of said output array of single mode fibers to retro-reflect the return signal back to the interrogator and further including a sensor that collects data with a data buffer to store said data.