Accession Number:
ADA224400
Title:
Thermal Imaging Assessment
Descriptive Note:
Interim rept. no. 2, 15 Jan-15 Feb 1990
Corporate Author:
SPECTRAL SCIENCES INC BURLINGTON MA
Personal Author(s):
Report Date:
1990-02-22
Pagination or Media Count:
26.0
Abstract:
This report investigates the feasibility of using advanced focal plane arrays coupled with telescopes as thermal imaging systems for orbiting targets. The infrared signature of a target will depend on a host of intercoupled factors including 1 surface properties temperature, emissivity, reflectivity, 2 illumination conditions solar position, earth background temperature, 3 target orientation, location, and dynamics with respect to the observer, and 4 atmospheric conditions along the illumination and target- observer paths. The determination of absolute surface temperatures of an unknown target is certainly a difficult if not infeasible problem without detailed knowledge of all of these factors. Here, we address the somewhat simpler problem of calculating the change in detected signal observed as a function of relative surface temperature differences, or conversely, given a sensor and its inherent characteristics, we attempt to determine the minimum detectable temperature difference measurable for a target surface of known characteristics.
Descriptors:
Subject Categories:
- Infrared Detection and Detectors