Phase Unwrapping in the Presence of Strong Turbulence

Abstract

Phase unwrapping in the presence of branch points using a least-squares wave-front reconstructor requires the use of a Postprocessing Congruence Operation (PCO). Branch cuts in the unwrapped phase are altered by the addition of a constant parameter h to the rotational component when applying the PCO. Past research has shown that selecting a value of h which minimizes the proportion of irradiance in the pupil plane adjacent to branch cuts helps to maximize performance of adaptive-optics (AO) systems in strong turbulence. In continuation of this objective, this research focuses on optimizing the PCO while accounting for the cumulative effects of the integral control law. Several optimizations are developed and compared using wave-optics simulations. The most successful optimization is shown to reduce the normalized variance of the Strehl ratio across a wide range turbulence strengths and frame rates, including decreases of up to 25 percent when compared to a non-optimized PCO algorithm. AO systems which depend on high, steady Strehl ratio values serve to benefit from these algorithms.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Mar 01, 2010
Accession Number
ADA517280

Entities

People

  • Casey J. Pellizzari

Organizations

  • Air Force Institute of Technology

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Adaptive Optics
  • Air Force
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Atmospheric Motion
  • Complex Variables
  • Computational Fluid Dynamics
  • Computational Science
  • Department Of Defense
  • Detection
  • Detectors
  • Differential Equations
  • Diffraction
  • Directed Energy Weapons
  • Military Operations
  • Optics
  • Partial Differential Equations
  • Two Dimensional

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Approximation Theory.
  • Atmospheric Science / Meteorology, specifically Wind Wave Turbulence.
  • Mycotoxin ecology in Amazonian ecosystems.