The Edgewood Research, Development, and Engineering Center (ERDEC) within the Chemical and Biological Defense Command (CBDCOM) is the Army's principal R&D center for chemical and biological defense technology, engineering, and service. ERDEC has been developing tunable 9 - 11 micron CO2 lidar systems for remote sensing of chemical agents for many years. However, due to the extended range requirements for conventional missions such as fixed site defense and reconnaissance, these systems are relatively large. Smaller, even handheld, standoff detection lidar systems would be useful for the individual warfighter or for decontamination efforts, as well as for numerous environmental monitoring applications. Lidar modeling calculations have been performed for such a system at the Night Vision and Electronic Sensors Directorate, (NVESD) the Army's lead laboratory for low energy lasers. The modeling indicates that fewer than 5 mJ of solid-state laser pulse energy would achieve the required detection sensitivity criteria for standoff chemical agent detection at ranges of several kilometers. This result coupled with recent advances in solid-state laser and frequency conversion technologies allow for extremely compact, tunable lasers and lidars to be produced which are suitable for a handheld standoff detection device. ERDEC has therefore begun an effort in development of compact 2 - 12 micron lasers and lidars. Three different approaches are being investigated and will be described. A review of completed efforts in tunable UV laser source development for remote sensing of biological agents via laser induced fluorescence (LIF) will also be presented.
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