Project Title:
Widely Tunable Gas Laser for Remote Sensing of Stratospheric Constituents
08.11-2227
Widely Tunable Gas Laser for Remote Sensing of Stratospheric Constituents
Rothe Technical Research
5205 Avenida Encinas, Suite E
Carlsbad
CA
92008
Rothe
Dietmar, E.
NAS7-970
Amount:
JPL
NAS7-935
Abstract:
The Phase I study has resulted in the definition of an advanced, compactmultigas TE laser for remote interrogation of the earth's atmosphere from a space
platform. Newly developed excimer laser and pulse power technology permit the design
of a laser with extended tunability in the UV and IR and with greatly increased efficiency.
Incorporation of these advances (e.g. prepulse-
assisted efficiency, impedance matching, constant-V,I PFL, X-ray preionization, magnetic
switching) lead to a doubling of the electric efficiency, longer system life, improved
discharge uniformity and higher beam quality.
The proposed system may be operated as a rare-gas halide (RGH) laser, a multi-atmospheric
CO2 laser, or as a DF laser. Narrowband, frequency-stabilized optical pulses are
tunable over the UV excimer bands and are continuously tunable from 9 to 11 um in
the IR. At 25 pulses per second, projected pulse energies are 2 to 5 J for CO2 and
0.2 to 2 J for RGH, with wallplug efficiencies of 4 to 7% and 2 to 3%, respectively.
Besides being ideally suited for the active sensing of upper atmospheric O3, H2O,
CH4, CO, N2O, NO2, SO2, HNO3, CH3Cl, LIF, the proposed system may be used for stratospheric
wind determinations by incoherent UV Doppler detection. Other NASA applications
are in aerosol monitoring, cloud-top mapping and mineral exploration.