A Feasibility Study of Optical Imaging through Atmospheric Obscurants

Abstract

IMAGES PROCESSOptical imaging of objects through atmospheric obscurants is an area of active research driven by national defense, commercial, and scientific interests. Multiple scattering of light by particles in the intervening medium (such as, cloud, aerosol, fog, smoke in the atmosphere) reduces signal intensity and signal-to-noise ratio, contributes to the blurring of image. Using pulsed lasers, time-gated detectors, and other techniques to sort out the ballistic and early snake photons from the diffusive photons it is possible to extract information about objects embedded in turbid media. The objective of the research is to carry out a theoretical investigation for photon starvation and image resolution, associated with imaging of a distant object through a scattering and obscuring medium. In this research, we estimate the feasibility of ballistic and snake light imaging at different distances computed using our analytical cumulant expansion method and compare it with results of the Monte Carlo simulation.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Mar 19, 2003
Accession Number
ADA415040

Entities

People

  • Robert Alfano
  • S. K. Gayen
  • W. Cai

Organizations

  • City College of New York

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms
  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Abstracts
  • Atmospheres
  • Boltzmann Equation
  • Detectors
  • Distribution Functions
  • Equations
  • Feasibility Studies
  • Lasers
  • Monte Carlo Method
  • National Security
  • Nutrition Disorders
  • Obscurants
  • Pulsed Lasers
  • Radiative Transfer
  • Scattering
  • Security
  • Simulations

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Atmospheric Remote Sensing.
  • Image Processing and Computer Vision.
  • Optical Physics and Photonics.

Technology Areas

  • Directed Energy