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Results for “Doppler Wind Lidars”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 217 records · Page 12
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1992

Sodium Doppler Temperature Lidar Observations of the Mesopause Region Temperature and Wind Structure

Measurements of the mesopause region temperature structure are being routinely conducted at Urbana, Illinois with the University of Illinois (UIUC) Sodium Doppler Temperature Lidar. The first measurements were taken with this system in Jan. 1991 and are now being made, and will soon be done routinely in conjunction with the temperature measurements. The results obtained with the UIUC Sodium Doppler Temperature Lidar (SDTL) are presented. A description of the system is given in accompanying articles.

Senft, Daniel C.↗
NASA NTRS1995

Lidar-measured winds from space: A key component for weather and climate prediction

The deployment of a space-based Doppler lidar would provide information that is fundamental to advancing the understanding and prediction of weather and climate. This paper reviews the concepts of wind measurement by Doppler lidar, highlights the results of some observing system simulation experiments with lidar winds, and discusses the important advances in earth system science anticipated with lidar winds. Observing system simulation experiments, conducted using two different general circulation models, have shown (1) that there is a significant improvement in the forecast accuracy over the Southern Hemisphere and tropical oceans resulting from the assimilation of simulated satellite wind data, and (2) that wind data are significantly more effective than temperature or moisture data in controlling analysis error. Because accurate wind observations are currently almost entirely unavailable for the vast majority of tropical cyclones worldwide, lidar winds have the potential to substan- tially improve tropical cyclone forecasts. Similarly, to improve water vapor flux divergence calculations, a direct measure of the ageostrophic wind is needed since the present level of uncer- tainty cannot be reduced with better temperature and moisture soundings alone.

Baker, Wayman E.↗
NASA NTRS2004

Wind Measurements with High Energy 2 Micron Coherent Doppler Lidar

A coherent Doppler lidar based on an injection seeded Ho:Tm:YLF pulsed laser was developed for wind measurements. A transmitted pulse energy over 75 mJ at 5 Hz repetition rate has been demonstrated. Designs are presented on the laser, injection seeding, receiver, and signal processing subsystems. Sample data of atmospheric measurements are presented including a wind profile extending from the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) to the free troposphere.

Barnes, Bruce W.↗
NASA NTRS2018

Wind Event Warning System

A method of detecting a wind event utilizing Doppler lidar includes causing a Doppler lidar unit to operate in a course scan mode in which a lidar beam is scanned along several directions. Line-of-sight wind speed measurements are generated at each direction and a derivative with respect to distance of the line-of-sight wind speed measurements is calculated at each of the directions. A predicted angular position of a wind event is determined, and the lidar unit may then operate in a fine scan mode in which only a limited sector is scanned. The potential wind event is then quantified utilizing data obtained using the fine scan mode.

Koch, Grady J.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Design and performance measurements of an airborne aerosol backscatter lidar

The global winds measurement application of coherent Doppler lidar requires intensive study of the global climatology of atmospheric aerosol backscatter at infrared wavelengths. An airborne backscatter lidar is discussed, which has been developed to measure atmospheric backscatter profiles at CO2 laser wavelengths. The instrument characteristics and representative flight measurement results are presented.

Menzies, Robert T.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Wind Measurements with a 355 nm Molecular Doppler Lidar

A Doppler lidar system based on the molecular double edge technique is described. The system is mounted in a modified van to allow deployment in field operations. The lidar operates with a tripled Nd:YAG laser at 355 nm, a 45cm aperture telescope and a matching azimuth-over-elevation scanner to allow full sky access. Validated atmospheric wind profiles have been measured from 1.8 km to 35 km with a 178 m vertical resolution. The range dependent rms deviation of the horizontal wind speed is 0.4 - 6 m/s. The results of wind speed and direction are in good agreement with balloon sonde wind measurements made simultaneously at the same location.

Gentry, Bruce M.↗
NASA NTRS1999

Considerations for Designing a Space Based Coherent Doppler Lidar

An orbiting coherent Doppler lidar for measuring winds is required to provide two basic pieces of data to the user community. The first is the line of sight wind velocity and the second is knowledge of the position at which the measurement was made. In order to provide this information in regions of interest the instrument is also required to have a certain backscatter sensitivity level. This paper outlines some of the considerations necessary in designing a coherent Doppler lidar for this purpose.

Spiers, Gary D.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Double-Edge Molecular Measurement of Lidar Wind Profiles at 355 nm

We built a direct detection Doppler lidar based on the double-edge molecular technique and made the first molecular based wind measurements using the eyesafe 355 nm wavelength. Three etalon bandpasses are obtained with Step etalons on a single pair of etalon plates. Long-term frequency drift of the laser and the capacitively stabilized etalon is removed by locking the etalon to the laser frequency. We use a low angle design to avoid polarization effects. Wind measurements of 1 to 2 m/s accuracy are obtained to 10 km altitude with 5 mJ of laser energy, a 750s integration, and a 25 cm telescope. Good agreement is obtained between the lidar and rawinsonde measurements.

Flesia, Cristina↗
NASA NTRS2015

Advances in High Energy Solid-State Pulsed 2-Micron Lidar Development for Ground and Airborne Wind, Water Vapor and CO2 Measurements

NASA Langley Research Center has a long history of developing 2-micron lasers. From fundamental spectroscopy research, theoretical prediction of new materials, laser demonstration and engineering of lidar systems, it has been a very successful program spanning around two decades. Successful development of 2-micron lasers has led to development of a state-of-the-art compact lidar transceiver for a pulsed coherent Doppler lidar system for wind measurement with an unprecedented laser pulse energy of 250 millijoules in a rugged package. This high pulse energy is produced by a Ho:Tm:LuLiF laser with an optical amplifier. While the lidar is meant for use as an airborne instrument, ground-based tests were carried out to characterize performance of the lidar. Atmospheric measurements will be presented, showing the lidar's capability for wind measurement in the atmospheric boundary layer and free troposphere. Lidar wind measurements are compared to a balloon sonde, showing good agreement between the two sensors. Similar architecture has been used to develop a high energy, Ho:Tm:YLF double-pulsed 2-micron Integrated Differential Absorption Lidar (IPDA) instrument based on direct detection technique that provides atmospheric column CO2 measurements. This instrument has been successfully used to measure atmospheric CO2 column density initially from a ground mobile lidar trailer, and then it was integrated on B-200 plane and 20 hours of flight measurement were made from an altitude ranging 1500 meters to 8000 meters. These measurements were compared to in-situ measurements and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) airborne flask measurement to derive the dry mixing ratio of the column CO2 by reflecting the signal by various reflecting surfaces such as land, vegetation, ocean surface, snow and sand. The lidar measurements when compared showed a very agreement with in-situ and airborne flask measurement. NASA Langley Research Center is currently developing a triple-pulsed 2-micron Integrated Differential Absorption Lidar (IPDA) instrument for simultaneous measurement of water vapor and carbon-dioxide column density measurement from an air-borne platform. This presentation will give an overview of the 2 decades of 2-micron coherent and direction detection of laser/lidar development at NASA Langley Research Center and will present the ground and airborne wind and column CO2 measurement intercomparison with in-situ, balloon and flask measurements.

Singh, Upendra N.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Wind Lidars for Aero-Assisted Entry, Descent, and Landing on Mars

NASA seeks to safely and consistently deliver 20 metric tons of payload to within 50m of the intended location on Mars. A study has been conducted to evaluate the utility of wind lidars to aid in aero-assisted entry, descent, and precision landing of vehicles carrying these payloads. Numerical simulation found that coherent-Doppler, infrared, aerosol-backscatter wind lidars on the Martian surface can measure winds nominally over a 15km radius hemisphere using eye-safe laser energies and optical apertures similar to those commercially available for terrestrial airport support. Such ground-based wind measurements around the target delivery site are useful for determining when to initiate atmospheric entry. Initial analyses of direct-Doppler, ultraviolet, molecular-backscatter wind lidars demonstrateforward-looking measurement of wind speed, atmospheric temperature, atmospheric density, and vehicle flight attitude beyond the vehicle boundary layer. These measurements would enable controlled flight of an aero-assisted cargo vehicle to the designated landing site.

Mars↗
NASA NTRS1984

Analysis of lidar, radar and satellite measurements on severe thunderstorms and their environments

Intercomparison of wind data from the airborne Doppler lidar, ground-based Doppler radars, the 444 m NSSL-KTVY tower, and rawinsonde were completed. The vertical profile of wind in the PBL measured by the radars compared favorably with the profiles measured by the tower and rawinsonde while the one obtained from lidar data differed from the other three by as much as 3m/sec in wind speed and 38 degrees in direction. The time dependence of differences in wind estimates from radar and lidar suggested that these discrepencies could be attributed to a Schuler resonance in the aircraft's inertial navigation system which caused an erroneous component of the aircraft's velocity vector to be subtracted from the lidar radial velocities, thus creating errors in the synthesized wind speed and direction. The vertical profile of turbulent fluctuations of the horizontal wind detected by the different systems compared well. Also, spectra from the different sensing systems compared well in both magnitude and shape, suggesting that the lidar and radar detected similar turbulent structure.

Bluestein, H.↗
NASA NTRS2003

HARLIE Aerosol and Cloud Structure and Wind Observations during HARGLO and IHOP

The Holographic Airborne Rotating Lidar Instrument Experiment (HARLIE) is a conical-scanning, 1-micron wavelength lidar that has been adapted for ground-based applications and used to infer horizontal wind information by tracking the motions of aerosol and cloud scattering structures. In addition, HARLIE's rapid continuous scanning enables boundary layer statistics and a new cloud lidar data product that gives cloud coverage as a function of altitude with high temporal resolution. HARLIE has been used in several field campaigns while developing the techniques for wind, boundary layer (BL), and cloud data products. These campaigns involved a variety of wind measuring instruments including rawindsondes, cloud-tracked winds from video imagery, Doppler lidars and Doppler radars. HARGLO-2 was one of these campaigns and was dedicated to wind profile intercomparisons over a 1-week period in November of 2001. The most recent of these campaigns was the International H20 Project (IHOP) located in the Southern Great Plains of the US during May and June of 2002.

Schwemmer, Geary K.↗
NASA NTRS1998

Analysis of Lidar Remote Sensing Concepts

An orbiting coherent Doppler lidar for measuring winds is required to provide two basic pieces of data to the user community. The first is the line of sight wind velocity and the second is knowledge of the position at which the measurement was made. In order to obtain this data for targets of interest to the atmospheric community the instrument must also have a level of backscatter sensitivity sufficient to achieve the goal. Sensitivity analyses for the line of sight velocity and position requirements for two lidar instruments, one with a nadir angle of 30 deg. in a 300 km altitude, 58 deg. inclination orbit and the second for a 45 deg. nadir angle instrument in a 833 km altitude , 89 deg. inclination orbit are performed. The issues relating to the backscatter sensitivity of a coherent lidar have been well documented previously and are not discussed here other than to identify a space-specific issue that does not typically need to be considered for ground and aircraft based coherent lidars. Section 2 and appendices A1 and A2 document these sensitivity analyses. This contract was intended to develop requirements for a space shuttle (STS) based coherent lidar however, shortly after the award of this contract NASA MSFC won the SPARCLE program to put a coherent Doppler lidar on STS. Consequently much of the work conducted under this contract has been documented within the development of the SPARCLE project documentation. The relevant portions of the SPARCLE documentation are identified in section 3.0 and included in appendices A3 and A4. Section 4.0 briefly outlines miscellaneous other activities that occurred under this contract.

Spiers, Gray D.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Flux estimation of the FIFE planetary boundary layer (PBL) with 10.6 micron Doppler lidar

A method is devised for calculating wind, momentum, and other flux parameters that characterize the planetary boundary layer (PBL) and thereby facilitate the calibration of spaceborne vs. in situ flux estimates. Single Doppler lidar data are used to estimate the variance of the mean wind and the covariance related to the vertically pointing fluxes of horizontal momentum. The skewness of the vertical velocity and the range of kinetic energy dissipation are also estimated, and the surface heat flux is determined by means of a statistical Navier-Stokes equation. The conclusion shows that the PBL structure combines both 'bottom-up' and 'top-down' processes suggesting that the relevant parameters for the atmospheric boundary layer be revised. The conclusions are of significant interest to the modeling techniques used in General Circulation Models as well as to flux estimation.

Gal-Chen, Tzvi↗
NASA NTRS1991

Comparison of 2 micron Ho and 10 micron CO2 lidar for atmospheric backscatter and Doppler windshear detection

The development of eye-safe, solid-state Lidar systems is discussed, with an emphasis on Coherent Doppler Lidar for Atmospheric Wind Measurements. The following subject areas are covered: tunable Ho DIAL (Differential Absorption Lidar)/lidar atmospheric measurements; atmospheric turbulence measurements and detector arrays; diurnal measurements of C(sub n)(sup 2) for KSC lidar measurements; and development of single-frequency Ho laser/lidar.

Killinger, Dennis↗
NASA NTRS1985

Coherent Doppler lidars: Current US 9-11 micrometer systems

To gain a proper perspective of the potential of coherent Doppler lidars for global wind sensing sometime in the future, we need to examine where we are, how we got here, and the expectations for future lidar system development. First we give a brief review of lidar developments leading to our present technology. Next we survey present U.S. infrared systems with particular attention to the pulsed systems since they are the ones that will have sufficient range to operate from satellites. Finally we comment on trends and probable future developments. Only unclassified lidars are considered. The considerable DoD support for classified applications certainly enhances future developments in components and subsystems.

Hall, Freeman F., Jr.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Potential Pitfalls Related to Space-Based Lidar Remote Sensing of the Earth with an Emphasis on Wind Measurement

A collection of issues is discussed that are potential pitfalls, if handled incorrectly, for earth-orbiting lidar remote sensing instruments. These issues arise due to the long target ranges, high lidar-to-target relative velocities, low signal levels, use of laser scanners, and other unique aspects of using lasers in earth orbit. Consequences of misunderstanding these topics range from minor inconvenience to improper calibration to total failure. We will focus on wind measurement using coherent detection Doppler lidar, but many of the potential pitfalls apply also to noncoherent lidar wind measurement, and to measurement of parameters other than wind. Each area will be identified as to its applicability.

Kavaya, Michael J.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Potential Pitfalls Related to Space-Based Lidar Remote Sensing of the Earth With an Emphasis on Wind Measurement

A collection of issues is discussed that are potential pitfalls, if handled incorrectly, for earth-orbiting lidar remote sensing instruments. These issues arise due to the long target ranges, high lidar-to-target relative velocities, low signal levels, use of laser scanners, and other unique aspects of using lasers in earth orbit. Consequences of misunderstanding these topics range from minor inconvenience to improper calibration to total failure. We will focus on wind measurement using coherent detection Doppler lidar, but many of the potential pitfalls apply also to noncoherent lidar wind measurement, and to measurement of parameters other than wind.

Kavaya, Michael J.↗