Abstract

A conceptual design study of the laser transmitter was completed during Phase A of the NASA's LAWS instrument development program. The proposed LAWS instrument is a space-based doppler lidar wind profiler consisting of a pulsed, frequency-stable laser as its transmitter, which is the subject of this paper. The telescope, heterodyne detection system and signal processor designs will be reported in another paper.⁽¹⁾ While both solid-state and CO₂ lasers were considered as potential candidates for the LAWS instrument, it became clear early on that CO₂ lasers had definite advantages over the solid-state at the present time. Although, the solid-state technology is rapidly advancing, it does not yet have the maturity enjoyed by the CO₂ technology.⁽²⁾ Furthermore, the CO₂ wavelength is clearly favored from eye safety consideration. Therefore, our design study was performed primarily for a pulsed CO₂ laser.

© 1991 Optical Society of America