CONTROL OF A RING LASER GYRO CAVITY ACCORDING TO A PRESELECTED MODEL

摘要

CONTROL OF A RING LASER GYRO CAVITYACCORDING TO A PRESELECTED MODELAbstract of the DisclosureA ring laser gyro having a cavity with at least onetransducer-actuated mirror is controlled to conform to apreselected model of cavity operation. Control isaccomplished by sampling cavity data, comparing the data tothe model to generate an error signal, and controlling themirror according to the error signal. In a preferredembodiment, at least two mirrors are dithered and the modeldefines an optimal amplitude of mirror dither at whichtheoretical lock-in error is zero. In another preferredembodiment, the sampled data corresponds to laser intensitywithin the cavity and the model defines an optimal intensitydisplaced from the maximum within an operating mode of thecavity. The model may define a plurality of operating modesof the cavity, ranked according to gyro performance fordifferent values of a preselected environmental condition.The environmental condition is then sensed on an ongoingbasis and used to select an optimal mode.