The off-axis three-mirror optical system is derived from the classical Cooke triplet or a derivative of the inverse telephoto lens. By properly arranging an internal reimaging mechanism or altering the location of the optical stop, one can create different versions of three-mirror optical systems. They include very compact configurations and wide field of view imagers. Insights into the optical design process, manufacturing, stray light management, and remote sensing applications are presented.
High performance megapixel focal plane arrays with small pixels have been widely used in modern optical remote sensing, astronomical, and surveillance instruments. In the prediction models applied in the traditional instrument performance analysis, the image of a point source is assumed to fall on the center of a detector pixel. A geometrical image of a point source in the realistic optical system may actually fall on any position on the detector pixel because the sensor’s line-of-sight includes pointing errors and jitter. This traditional assumption may lead to an optimistic error, estimated at between 10% and 20%. We present the critical factors that impact the performance estimate in a realistic instrument design based on the prediction for the noise equivalent power (NEP). They are the optical centroid efficiency (OCE) and the ensquared energy, or more precisely, the energy on the rectangular detector pixel (EOD).
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