OPTICAL SENSOR WITH HIGH DIRECTIONAL RESOLUTION

I3C PROPOSES TO USE ITS EXPERIENCE IN FIBER OPTICS AND MONOPULSE DIRECTION FINDING SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT TO DESIGN A SENSOR THAT WILL HAVE EXCEPTIONALLY HIGH PROBABILITY OF DETECTION OF INTERMITTANT POINT SOURCES OF LIGHT ENERGY. BY INTEGRATING MANY INDIVIDUAL LENS/ DETECTOR ELEMENTS INTERCONNECTED BY OPTICAL FIBERS, THE SENSOR WILL BE ABLE TO RESOLVE SEPARATE SOURCES TO A VERY SMALL FRACTION OF A DEGREE IN ANGLE OF ARRIVAL OF THE LIGHT ENERGY. THE DESIGN WILL PROVIDE FOR MULTIPLE WAVELENGTH DETECTION AND FULLY AUTOMATED (ELECTRONIC) ANGLE CALCULATION (USING WELL KNOWN AMPLITUDE COMPARISON TECHNIQUES) AND SIMPLE ABILITY TO TRACK RELATIVE MOTION OF A RAPIDLY MOVING SOURCE. OUR RESEARCH WILL NOT ONLY TRADE SEVERAL PARAMETERS SUCH AS SENSITIVITY, RESOLUTION, NUMBER OF LENS/DETECTOR ELEMENTS FOR TWO PI STERADIAN INSTANTANEOUS COVERAGE, BUT WILL INCLUDE EXPERIMENTAL DATA FROM A LIMITED FIELD OF VIEW BREADBOARD WE WILL FABRICATE AND TEST DURING PHASE I. A DETAILED PLAN FOR DEVELOPMENT AND TEST OF FULL SCALE PROTOTYPE OF A LIGHT WEIGHT SENSOR FOR FLIGHT TESTING WILL BE DEVELOPED. OUR RESEARCH ALSO ADDRESSES THE ISSUE OF PRODUCEABILITY AND RELIABILITY OF THE OPTICAL ELEMENTS PLUS THE CONCEPT OF AN INTEGRATED PROCESSOR FOR CORRELATION OF DETECTED EVENS WITH THEIR RELATIVE POSITIONS.