Holographic Polarimetric Laser Radar for Surveillance and Discrimination

In order to protect soldiers in modern combat situations, there is growing interest in utilizing unmanned vehicles where possible. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV's) and Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUV's) must navigate reliably in a variety of complex environments giving rise to the need for miniaturized, low cost LADAR which can provide accurate ranging data. Several LADAR solutions exist which are compatible with larger Unmanned Ground Vehicles, but most of these technologies cannot readily be transferred to miniaturized platforms. Salvador Imaging proposes the development of a 2"x2.2"x3.5" flash LADAR system which provides precise snapshots of 3-D data at an update rate of up to 100 frames per second. Unlike scanning LADAR approaches, the entire data set for each range image is captured simultaneously. Thus, artifact from target or platform motion is eliminated. The proposed solution will provide robust navigation and obstacle avoidance for vehicles which must be agile enough to effectively maneuver in modern tactical environments. The proposed system has the added advantage that, in addition to providing range information, imaging polarimetry data is simultaneously available to significantly increase the performance of automated target identification algorithms and reducing false alarms.