Abstract

The LASE receiver, which is to be flown on NASA's Earth Resources aircraft (ER-2), is a thermally and mechanically stable optical receiver that is spectrally tunable over the region 726.5 to 732 nm. The receiver consists of two parts, a Dall-Kirkham telescope and aft-optics. The barrel of the receiver is made of graphite epoxy to maintain the primary-to-secondary mirror spacing to within 0.001 in. over the 1540 C operating range. The primary and secondary mirrors are both Zerodur for thermal stability. The aft-optics consist of two avalanche-photodiode channels, a quad-detector channel, a tunable interference filter, and an adjustable field-of-view iris. The alignment of the optical system is monitored with the quad detector. A microprocessor provides active control of the spectral tuning of the interference filter by adjusting the tilt angle as a function of temperature. The microprocessor also provides control of an adjustable field stop to select, on command, the field-of-view of the receiver.

© 1990 Optical Society of America