Temporal correlation measurements of pulsed dual CO_2 lidar returns

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
The temporal correlation and statistical properties of backscattered returns from specular and diffuse topographic targets have been measured by using a pulsed dual-laser direct-detection lidar system operating near 10.6 μm. Our results show that atmospheric-turbulence fluctuations can effectively be frozen for pulse separation times of the order of 1–3 msec or less. However, only incomplete correlation was achieved; the diffuse target returns yielded much lower correlation than that obtained with the specular targets. This is shown to be due to uncorrelated system noise effects and different statistics for the two types of target returns.