Engineering topics
Publications and source records attributed to Breckinridge, J. B..
This paper reviews the requirements and challenges we face to engineer and build the large area and very sensitive focal planes for interferometers and innovative single aperture telescopes to detect and characterize Earth-type planets around stars other than our sun.
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Inflatable optics have the potential for a large reduction in lauch mass and volume, but they involve significant challenges to achieve the wavefront accuracy requred for diffraction-limited operation in the visible and near IR.
A Folded Astronomical Space Telescope (FAST) is a 2.4-m Hubble Space Telescope (HST) class of telescope that can be packaged in a 1.5-m diameter cylinder through use of a single ring of eight deployable segments. Because it has less mass and uses a much smaller booster to inject it into orbit, the cost is greatly reduced.
Several levels of wavefront control are necessary for the optimum performance of very large telescopes, especially segmented ones like the Large Deployable Reflector. In general, the major contributors to wavefront error are the segments of the large primary mirror. Wavefront control at the largest optical surface may not be the optimum choice because of the mass and inaccessibility of the elements of this surface that require upgrading. The concept of two-stage optics was developed to permit a poor wavefront from the large optics to be upgraded by means of a wavefront corrector at a small exit pupil of the system.
Image data processed faster than in present electronic systems. Optical parallel-processing system effectively calculates two-dimensional Fourier transforms in time required by light to travel from plane 1 to plane 8. Coherence interferometer at plane 4 splits light into parts that form double image at plane 6 if projection screen placed there.
A study was carried out at JPL during the first quarter of 1985 to develop a system concept for NASA's LDR. Major features of the concept are a four-mirror, two-stage optical system; a lightweight structural composite segmented primary reflector; and a deployable truss backup structure with integral thermal shield. The two-stage optics uses active figure control at the quaternary reflector located at the primary reflector exit pupil, allowing the large primary to be passive. The lightweight composite reflector panels limit the short-wavelength operation to approximately 30 microns but reduce the total primary reflector weight by a factor of 3 to 4 over competing technologies. On-orbit thermal analysis indicates a primary reflector equilibrium temperature of less than 200 K with a maximum gradient of about 5 C across the 20-m aperture. Weight and volume estimates are consistent with a single Shuttle launch, and are based on Space Station assembly and checkout.
Three imaging spectrometers and two camera systems for remote sensing are described. Two of the imaging spectrometers are versions of the Visible and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) for Mars Observer and the Comet Rendezvous Asteroid Flyby (CRAF) mission. The other spectrometer is the Airborne Visible/Infrared Imaging Spectrometer (AVIRIS) which is currently under construction. The optical imaging systems are the wide angle and narrow angle cameras for the CRAF mission.
High resolution achieved with wide field of view. Imaging Spectrometer features off-axis reflecting optics, including reflecting "slit" that also serves as field flattener. Only refracting element is prism. By scanning slit across object or scene and timing out signal, both spectral and spatial information in scene are obtained.
Efficient linear dispersive element for spectrometer instruments achieved using several different glasses in multiple-element prism. Good results obtained in both two-and three-element prisms using variety of different glass materials.
Disclosed is an otpical system used in a spacecraft to observe a remote surface and provide a spatial and spectral image of this surface. The optical system includes aspheric and spherical mirrors aligned to focus at a first focal plane an image of the surface, and a mirror at this first focal plane which reflects light back on to the spherical mirror. This spherical mirror collimates the light and directs it through a prism which disperses it. The dispersed light is then focused on an array of light responsive elements disposed at a second focal plane. The prism is designed such that it disperses light into components of different wavelengths, with the components of shorter wavelengths being dispersed more than the components of longer wavelengths to present at the second focal plane a distribution pattern in which preselected groupings of the components are dispersed over essentially equal spacing intervals.
Instrument efficient, lightweight, and stable. Fourier-transform spectrometer configuration uses electronic, instead of mechanical, scanning. Configuration insensitive to vibration-induced sampling errors introduced into mechanically scanned systems.
Off-axis Fresnel zone plate used to obtain fringe visibility close to unity. Holographic Twyman-Green Interferometer (HTG) employs off-axis Fresnel zone plate (OFZP) as beam splitter and beam diverger in place of two separate elements that perform those functions in conventional TwymanGreen interferometer.
An optical systems design approach for a parallel optical processor that has an information throughput capacity in excess of one petabit per second is discussed. This system enables predetection processing of white light, passively illuminated scenes. Integrated with a programmable Van der Lugt filter, this system is an effective data compression method. A program to implement this parallel optical processing by interferometry system is discussed.
Recent progress is described in the use of Brillouin and Raman scattering for the measurement of temperature and salinity in the ocean. The use of Brillouin scattering is described for the measurement of the sound velocity, and the use of Raman scattering is described for the independent measurement of the temperature and salinity. Coupling these techniques permits the assessment of both temperature and salinity. The experimental techniques are described together with the results of recent experiments and an assessment of the errors to be expected.
A new wide-angle imaging spectrometer configuration is proposed where an all-reflecting Schmidt camera is used with a prism spectrometer to give a field of view up to 60 deg or more. Four different designs using this approach are presented. These are the Imaging Spectrometer Free Flyer, the Shuttle Imaging Spectrometer A, the Shuttle Imaging Spectrometer B, and the Wide-Field System. These systems are capable of broadband spectral coverage from 0.4 to 2.5 microns, with footprints 20 m on a side or less, and with swath widths hundreds of kilometers; they are capable of spectral resolving powers of 200 or more.
A major requirement of multispectral imaging systems for advanced Earth remote sensing is the provision for greater spectral resolution and more versatile spectral band selection. The imaging spectrometer instrument concept provides this versatility by the combination of pushbroom imaging and spectrally dispersing optics using area array detectors in the focal plane. The shuttle imaging spectrometer concept achieves 10- and 20-meter ground instantaneous fields of view with 20-nanometer spectral resolution from Earth Orbit. Onboard processing allows the selection of spectral bands during flight; this, in turn, permits the sensor parameters to be tailored to the experiment objectives. Advances in optical design, infrared detector arrays, and focal plane cooling indicate the feasibility of the instrument concept and support the practicability of a validation flight experiment for the shuttle in the late 1980s.
A dichromated gelatin off-axis Fresnel zone plate was designed, fabricated, and used in a new type of interferometer for optical metrology. This single hologram optical element combines the functions of a beam splitter, beam diverger, and aberrated null lens. Data presented show the successful application for an interferometric test of an f/6, 200-mm diam parabolic mirror.