Abstract

Modern lidar systems are capable of probing atmospheric composition and structure from the troposphere into the lower thermosphere with exceptional accuracy and resolution. Sophisticated ground based and airborne systems are now operated routinely and several organizations are developing satellite-borne lidars for deployment during the next decade. The last five years has been a period of substantial growth in lidar capabilities, particularly for middle atmosphere applications principally because of advances in certain critical areas of laser technology. Perhaps the most significant of these has been the development of highpower, ultra-stable, narrowband, lasers which are now being used in Doppler/temperature lidars. Most of the important lidar applications place challenging demands on die laser specifications. Narrow linewidths (~100 MHz), wavelength inability, high frequency stability (~1-10 MHz), diffraction limited beam quality and high average output powers (~1-100 W) are required for some of the most critical measurements. Systems utilizing dye lasers can achieve many of these specifications over much of the optical spectrum from the near IR to the near UV. However, dye lasers are complicated, cumbersome to operate and ill-suited for spacebome and some airborne applications.

© 1991 Optical Society of America