Search NASA⌕ Search

Engineering topics

Ramos-Izquierdo, L.

Publications and source records attributed to Ramos-Izquierdo, L..

Performance Modeling of an Airborne Raman Water Vapor Lidar

A sophisticated Raman lidar numerical model had been developed. The model has been used to simulate the performance of two ground-based Raman water vapor lidar systems. After tuning the model using these ground-based measurements, the model is used to simulate the water vapor measurement capability of an airborne Raman lidar under both day-and night-time conditions for a wide range of water vapor conditions. The results indicate that, under many circumstances, the daytime measurements possess comparable resolution to an existing airborne differential absorption water vapor lidar while the nighttime measurement have higher resolution. In addition, a Raman lidar is capable of measurements not possible using a differential absorption system.

Whiteman, D. N.↗

Diode-pumped laser research

The Laboratory for Oceans is currently working on the development of compact laser diode array (LD) pumped Nd:YAG lasers for use in space-based altimetry and ranging. Laser diode-array pumping technology promises to increase the electrical to optical efficiency of solid state lasers by an order of magnitude with a lifetime increase of nearly three orders of magnitude relative to today's conventional flashlamp-pumped laser systems. The small size, efficiency, and ruggedness make LD-pumped solid state lasers ideal for space based applications. In an in-house RTOP effort, a novel multiple-pass LD-pumped Nd:YAG laser amplifier was designed and tested to increase the 100 microjoule output pulse energy of the Lightwave laser oscillator. Preliminary results have yielded a round trip amplifier gain of about 15 percent using 7 microjoule LD-pump energy. As a parallel activity, funding was recently obtained to investigate the possible use of custom made fiber optic arrays to obtain an efficient optical coupling mechanism between the emitting laser diode-arrays and the target solid state laser material. Fiber optic coupling arrays would allow for the easy manipulation of the spatial emitting pattern of the diode pump sources to match either an end or side pumping laser configuration.

Ramos-Izquierdo, L.↗