Project Title:
Two-Gigahertz-Bandwidth, 2000-Channel, Acousto-Optic Bragg Cell and Spectrometer
08.14-8181
911040
Two-Gigahertz-Bandwidth, 2000-Channel, Acousto-Optic Bragg Cell and Spectrometer
Photonic Systems, Inc.
1800 Penn Street, Suite 4B
Melbourne
FL
32901-2625
Dennis R.
Pape
407-984-8181
JPL
NAS7-1177
160
08.14-8181
911040
Abstract:
Two-Gigahertz-Bandwidth, 2000-Channel, Acousto-Optic Bragg Cell and Spectrometer
Radiometer spectrometers are used in millimeter-wave radio astronomy for the spectral
measurement of molecular rotational transitions. The spectrum of interest spans tens
of GHz, and the measurement time to obtain a useful signal-to-noise ratio is large.
The low power per channel and simplicity of acousto-optic technology has led to the
current development of acousto-optic spectrometers (AOS) with 1 GHz bandwidth and
1000 channels. Additional AOS bandwidth and channelization is needed to increase
spectral coverage and to reduce overall data acquisition time. The project objective
is to develop a 2 GHz bandwidth, 1 MHz frequency resolution acousto-optic Bragg cell
with properties, including low-optical scatter using a shear acoustic mode, required
for stable AOS systems. Since other AOS components are already capable of supporting
this bandwidth and channelization, the development of this new Bragg cell will result
in the immediate development of a 2 GHz bandwidth, 2000 channel spectrometer, a significant
advancement over current performance.
Acousto-optic systems designed for applications such as real-time spectrum analysis,
seismic processing, and medical imaging would benefit from the advanced performance
offered by the new device described here. New developments in acousto-optic Bragg
cell design can also be applied to a variety of devices used in commercial scanning
technology.
acousto-optic Bragg cell, radiometer spectrometer