Mikhail Belenkii (Trex Enterprises Corporation), Don Bruns (Trex Enterprises Corporation) Kevin A. Hughes (Trex Enterprises Corporation) Vincent A. Rye (Trex Enterprises Corporation) Frank Eaton (Air Force Research Laboratory)
Keywords: Atmospherics
Abstract:
Knowledge of the turbulence profile is important for various applications including directed energy systems such as Airborne Laser and Tactical Airborne Laser, ground-based adaptive optics telescopes, and laser communication systems. The known methods for turbulence profile determination have various limitations. We present a concept of a cross-path LIDAR that overcomes these shortcomings. Our sensor system uses laser guide star technology combined with a cross-path wavefront sensing technique. This sensor has several advantages as compared with the known approaches. A cross-path LIDAR has high spatial and temporal resolution, can operate along arbitrary atmospheric paths in the presence of strong turbulence both at daytime and night, and does not depend on the availability of binary stars. We evaluated the feasibility of this approach by carrying out a performance and error budget analysis, developing an analytical model for the wavefront slope cross-correlation and validating this model using wave optics code, examining the sensitivity of the wavefront slope cross-correlation to the variations of the turbulence profile, and developing and testing an inversion algorithm for reconstruction of the turbulence profile from the optical measurements, as well as developing conceptual LIDAR design. The performed study confirmed that the cross-path LIDAR is feasible.
Date of Conference: September 12-15, 2007
Track: Atmospherics