KEYWORDS: Signal to noise ratio, Synthetic aperture imaging, LIDAR, Image processing, Signal processing, Analog electronics, Receivers, Transmitters, Interference (communication), Sensors
The static-mode down-looking synthetic aperture imaging ladar (SAIL) can keep the target and carrying-platform still during the collection process. Improvement of the signal-to-noise ratio in static-mode down-looking SAIL is investigated. The signal-to-noise ratio is improved by increasing scanning time and sampling rate in static-mode down-looking SAIL. In the experiment, the targets are reconstructed in different scanning time and different sampling rate. As the increasing of the scanning time and sampling rate, the reconstructed images become clearer. These techniques have a great potential for applications in extensive synthetic aperture imaging ladar fields.
A structure similar to the direct detection of the DPSK signals using polarization dependent free space Mach-Zehnder interferometer is set up to validate its ability for coherent ranging. M sequence is adopted for its superior performance in code compression. The resultant signal voltage is sampled instead of being zero crossing detected and cross-correlated with the modulation signal sampled at the same rate. The ranging peak appears in the one target setup after proper calibration of the interferometric bias point but doesn’t imply any correct range information. For the two range resolved targets, the output image doesn’t depict two independent peaks. The further study is being conducted.
The design and laboratory experiment of a demonstrator of all-optronic down-looking synthetic aperture imaging ladar
(SAL) is presented in this paper, in which the sensing-to-processing chain is carried out with light. The ultra-fast
processing capability from image acquisition to real-time reconstruction is shown. The demonstrator consists of a
down-looking SAL unit with a beam scanner and an optical processor. The down-looking SAL unit has a transmitter of
two coaxial orthogonally polarized beams and a receiver of polarization-interference self-heterodyne balanced detection.
The linear phase modulation and the quadratic phase history are produced by the projection of movable cylindrical lenses.
Three functions of strip-map mode, spotlight mode and static mode are available. The optical processor is an astigmatic
optical system, which reduces to a Fourier transform system and a free-space of the Fresnel diffraction to realize the
matched filtering. A spatial light modulator is used as the input interface. The experiment is performed with an optical
collimator. The system design is given, too. The down-looking SAL has the features such as a big coverage with an
enhanced receiving aperture and little influence from atmospheric turbulence and the optical processor is simple.
The implementation of down-looking Synthetic Aperture Imaging Ladar(SAIL) uses quadratic phase history reconstruction in the travel direction and linear phase modulation reconstruction in the orthogonal direction. And the linear phase modulation in the orthogonal direction is generated by the shift of two cylindrical lenses in the two polarization-orthogonal beams. Therefore, the fast-moving of two cylindrical lenses is necessary for airborne down-looking SAIL to match the aircraft flight speed and to realize the compression of the orthogonal direction, but the quick start and the quick stop of the cylindrical lenses must greatly damage the motor and make the motion trail non-uniform. To reduce the damage and get relatively well trajectory, we make the motor move like a sinusoidal curve to make it more realistic movement, and through a resampling interpolation imaging algorithm, we can transform the nonlinear phase to linear phase, and get good reconstruction results of point target and area target in laboratory. The influences on imaging quality in different sampling positions when the motor make a sinusoidal motion and the necessity of the algorithm are analyzed. At last, we perform a comparison of the results of two cases in resolution.
The down-looking synthetic aperture imaging ladar (SAIL) with electro-optic modulation was proposed. The measurement uses electrically controlled scanner to produce beams with spatial parabolic phase difference, which consists of electro-optic crystal and cylindrical lens. Due to the high modulation rate without mechanical scanning, this technique has a great potential for applications in extensive synthetic aperture imaging ladar fields. The phase mapping of electrically controlled scanner under the different applied voltage is achieved and measured by the polarized digital holographic interferometry. The phase mappings of the scanner in the down-looking SAIL with the o-polarized light and e-polarized light are obtained. The linear phase distribution and the parabolic phase distribution are observed after applying the external electric field. The corresponding analyses and discussions are proposed to explain the phenomena.
Synthetic aperture radar interferometry (InSAR) can gain three-dimensional topography with high spatial resolution and height accuracy using across track interferometry[1]. Conventional InSAR produce three-dimensional images from SAR data. But when the working wavelength transit from microwave to optical wave, the transmission antenna and receive antenna become very sensitive to platform vibration and beam quality[2]. Through differential receive antenna formation, we can relax the requirement of platform and laser using synthetic aperture imaging ladar (SAIL) concept[3]. Line-of-sight motion constraints are reduced by several orders of magnitude. We introduce two distinctive forms of antenna formation according to the position of interferogram. The first architecture can simplify the interferogram processing and phase extraction algorithm under time-division multiplex operation. The second architecture can process the 2D coordinate and height coordinate at the same time. Using optical diffraction theory, a systematic theory of side-looking SAIL is mathematically formulated and the necessary conditions for assuring a correct phase history are established[4]. Based on optical transformation and regulation of wavefront, a side-looking SAIL of two distinctive architectures is invented and the basic principle, systematic theory, design equations and necessary conditions are presented. It is shown that high height accuracy can be reached and the influences from atmospheric turbulence and unmodeled line-of-sight motion can be automatically compensated.
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