Requirements Definition and Preliminary Design for a Stray Light Test Station

The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) seeks innovations that "ease the effort required to perform integration and testing." One specific MDA interest is "metrology technologies for the rejection of stray light." Controlling stray light in ballistic missile defense (BMD) sensors is essential to target detection, discrimination and acquisition. Defense sensors must contend with the sun, the moon, the earth limb, and countermeasures, at virtually any angle relative to the sensor boresight. If a sensor is blinded by the sun or lured away by a countermeasure the result is no different than a failed launch. Therefore, mission assurance depends on defining realistic stray light requirements, designing sensors to meet those requirements, and verifying (by test) sensor stray light performance. This proposal response addresses stray light testing. In Phase 1 work we plan to define requirements and complete the preliminary design for a stray light test station for missile defense sensors.