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The optical pointing sensor provides a means of directly measuring the relative positions of JPL s Formation Control Testbed (FCT) vehicles without communication. This innovation is a steerable infrared (IR) rangefinder that gives measurements in terms of range and bearing to a passive retroreflector.
The Modulation Sideband Technology for Absolute Range (MSTAR) architecture is the basis of design of a proposed laser-based heterodyne interferometer that could measure a range (distance) as great as 100 km with a precision and resolution of the order of 1 nm. Simple optical interferometers can measure changes in range with nanometer resolution, but cannot measure range itself because interference is subject to the well-known integer-multiple-of-2 -radians phase ambiguity, which amounts to a range ambiguity of the order of 1 m at typical laser wavelengths. Existing rangefinders have a resolution of the order of 10 m and are therefore unable to resolve the ambiguity. The proposed MSTAR architecture bridges the gap, enabling nanometer resolution with an ambiguity range that can be extended to arbitrarily large distances. The MSTAR architecture combines the principle of the heterodyne interferometer with the principle of extending the ambiguity range of an interferometer by using light of two wavelengths. The use of two wavelengths for this purpose is well established in optical metrology, radar, and sonar. However, unlike in traditional two-color laser interferometry, light of two wavelengths would not be generated by two lasers. Instead, multiple wavelengths would be generated as sidebands of phase modulation of the light from a single frequency- stabilized laser. The phase modulation would be effected by applying sinusoidal signals of suitable frequencies (typically tens of gigahertz) to high-speed electro-optical phase modulators. Intensity modulation can also be used
With advances in lasers and electro-optic technology, lidar is becoming an established technique for remote sensing of the Earth and planets from space. Some of the earliest space-based lidar measurements were made in the early 1970s from lunar orbit using the laser altimeter on the Apollo 15 mission. Space lidar instruments in active use today include the MOLA instrument aboard the Mars Global Surveyor mission and the Near Laser Rangefinder on the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) Mission. This talk will review laser remote sensing techniques, critical technologies, and some results from past and present NASA missions. It will also review near term plans for NASA's ICESat and Picasso missions and summarize some concepts for lidar on future missions.
In this paper the design and modeling of a sensor system that gives relative position measurements is described. The position is provided in the form of bearing and range to a retro target placed on a far field target.