Resolution Capabilities of off-Axis Detector Elements in Paraboloidal Optical Systems

摘要

This report presents a new approach to the optical analysis of infrared detection systems, which avoids the ambiguous nature of spot diagrams. By analyzing an ideal paraboloidal optical system, a unique equation is derived which can be used to determine how much light, emitted from a point source and incident upon the collecting aperture, is actually focused upon a given detector. The alignment of a detector element both along the optical axis (focusing) and normal to the optical axis (centering) is shown to be critical. The IBM 704 digital computer was used to obtain numerical results which show that a maximum of 9 elements can be used with an f/1 system. This is true regardless of the size of the individual elements, since the distance to the outer element increases linearly with element size and the optical defects increase linearly with distance off axis. The computation results were then applied to a real system in order to show the effects of optical defects upon the dynamic resolution of a scanning system. (Author)