Turret Integration Techniques for Transonic and Supersonic Flight Applications

Use of an airborne platform for a directed energy system is currently severely limited by aero-optic aberrations arising from density variations in air flowing over the aircraft; the primary limitation is for aft pointing applications. Innovative Technology Applications Company (ITAC), in collaboration with the University of Toledo (UT), is working to develop techniques of integrating flow control with a turret/adaptive fairing design that provides a large field of regard for propagation of a lethal beam from an airborne platform at subsonic, transonic and supersonic speeds. BENEFIT: The technology developed in the proposed work to improve field of regard for aircraft-mounted turrets will make these systems significantly more capable, both for the anti-missile and communications role. There are potential commercial applications for optical communications for transonic aircraft. Related applications may benefit other optical systems, such as vehicle-mounted cameras and telescopes.