High Altitude Non-Acoustic Antisubmarine Warfare (ASW)

Intevac proposes to design and build an Intensified Photodiode (IPD) which can be gated on and off very quickly with relatively low voltage. This gated IPD would be an ideal detector for laser pulse reflections from objects in sea water. Gating the detector on for only the time periods when reflections could be received from possible objects of interest greatly extends detector lifetime and reduces noise, thus increasing object detectability. In a Phase 1 contract Intevac studied possible designs, determined that the desired gating could be achieved, and reported on the tradeoffs in performance for several possible designs. This Phase 2 proposal includes designing and building the gated IPD which most closely matches NAVAIR’s operational requirements. A Phase 2 Option would provide NAVAIR with additional operational IPDs.