Abstract: A silicon wafer is provided which does not employ individually bonded leads between the IR sensitive elements and the input stages of multiplexers. The wafer is first coated with lead selenide in a first detector array area and is thereafter coated with lead sulfide within a second detector array area. The described steps result in the direct chemical deposition of lead selenide and lead sulfide upon the silicon wafer to eliminate individual wire bonding, bumping, flip chiping, planar interconnecting methods of connecting detector array elements to silicon chip circuitry, e.g., multiplexers, to enable easy fabrication of very long arrays. The electrode structure employed, produces an increase in the electrical field gradient between the electrodes for a given volume of detector material, relative to conventional electrode configurations.

Abstract: A target is illuminated through an optically distorting region, such as atmospheric turbulence or non-precision optics, by coherent light and a first set of data is recorded indicative of the complex amplitude of scattered radiation and such target is thereafter illuminated by incoherent light to produce a second set of data indicative of the nature of the region; the second set is divided into the first set, and the resulting data is Fourier-transformed to produce a diffraction-limited target image.

Abstract: An infrared photodetector is disclosed which is deposited directly onto a Joule-Thomson cryostat. The cryostat includes an elongated body having gas-carrying channels contained therein. The photodetector is deposited directly onto one end of the elongated body to form a direct thermal path between the detector and cryostat, thereby eliminating the need for any intermediate thermal bridge such as a mechanical bond, thermal conductive paste or epoxy. The direct contact between the photodetector material and the cryostat reduces the thermal mass of the structure to be cooled by the cryostat, thereby decreasing both the time and the quantity of gas required to cool the detector.

Abstract: A fluoroscopic image is processed digitally using a television camera operating at a frame rate of at least 30 frames per second viewing the image and providing an analog video output, a digitizer which digitizes the analog video output to provide digital information representative of the analog signal, a plurality of frame processors which carry out arithmetic and logical operations on the digital image information and are operable at the frame rate of the television camera coupled to the output of the digitizer, a 2-D filter operable at the frame rate of the television camera coupled to said frame processors, a converter and interface to convert digital image information processed in the frame processors and 2-D filter back into an analog signal and television display coupled to the output of the converter for displaying the processed signal.

Abstract: A laser mirror having a cooled deformable reflecting surface is disclosed. The mirror's base includes a manifold for distributing coolant toward the mirror's faceplate and for receiving coolant which has circulated through the faceplate. The faceplate is comprised of a thin, deformable sheet of material which has a polished surface for reflecting laser radiation therefrom. The facesheet is supported above the base manifold by one or more actuators which may be selectively operated to selectively deform the mirror's reflecting surface. The faceplate includes one or more enclosed, elongated spaces which transverse substantially the entire width of the faceplate and through which coolant may be circulated to cool the faceplate. Coolant conducting members located around the periphery of the faceplate carry coolant between the faceplate and the base manifold to remove heat absorbed by the faceplate from the laser signal impinging on the mirror's reflecting surface.

Abstract: Interference from frequency modulated transmitter signals, such as radar jamming signals, is cancelled in a nearby receiver by orthogonally related cancellation signals derived from the transmitter signal. The cancellation signals are controlled or modulated by corresponding cancellation modulation signals derived from the transmitter frequency modulation signal superposed on weighting signals. The employment of the transmitter frequency modulation signal as part of the cancellation modulation signals reduces cancellation error resulting from differences in frequency dependent delay shift in different transmission paths for the interfering signal and the cancellation signal.

Abstract: A cooled deformable mirror having a continuous mirror surface and a method for cooling a deformable mirror having a continuous mirror surface are disclosed. In the preferred embodiments, one or more enclosed spaces within the mirror's faceplate are supplied with coolant through one or more actuators used to deform the mirror surface and one or more other of the actuators are used to remove coolant from the mirror faceplate. The deformable mirror includes a base manifold which receives coolant from an external source and distributes the coolant to selected ones of the actuators for distribution within the faceplate. Coolant removed from the faceplate by others of the actuators is returned to the base manifold from which it is returned to the external source. Another preferred embodiment further includes a coolant distribution manifold in the faceplate to facilitate the distribution of coolant within the faceplate after the coolant has been delivered to the faceplate by the apertures in one or more actuators.

Abstract: A lightweight deformable mirror suitable for space applications is disclosed in which a plurality of electrically-operated electrodistortive actuators may be used to selectively deform the mirror's reflecting surface. The actuators are sandwiched between a pair of thin sheets of glass with the surface of one sheet finished to form the mirror's reflecting surface. By selectively energizing one or more of the actuators, the mirror surface can be deformed to correct aberrations in optical wavefronts impinging on the mirror or to encode signals into wavefronts projected onto the mirror surface. Electrical connections to the actuators may be made through printed circuit connections which are contained on the bottom sheet of the deformable mirror.

Abstract: A method of image motion distortion correction involving the steps of electronically scanning an optical image to produce first and second lines of stored digital pixel data indicative of the intensity of picture elements of the optical image, registering within a corresponding scanning window position the difference between each second line picture element value of a number of sets of second line picture elements, and a number of first individual line picture elements, each corresponding to an associated set, thereafter utilizing that particular window position having the minimum accumulated difference value to produce an image shift signal having a value corresponding to that particular window position, shifting the storage position of the second line with respect to the first line by an amount proportional to the value of the shift signal, and utilizing the shifted lines of data to modulate an image producing readout device such as a CRT to reproduce the optical image.

Abstract: An improved shearing interferometer is provided having an acousto-optic cell wherein two sets of orthogonal diffraction gratings are formed therein by applying two electrical signals thereto having different frequencies. A wavefront to be examined is passed through the cell, and both signal frequencies applied to the cell are varied to cause the resulting shearing interferogram to be sequentially directed at a pair of orthogonal linear photodetector arrays. The degree of shear may be readily adjusted by changing the difference between the frequencies of the two signals applied to the cell.

Abstract: An overload protector, using a power-dissipating element for receiving and dissipating excessive radio-frequency power, can safely transfer a signal from an input to an output. The protector also has a detector coupled to the input for providing a bias current in response to an input signal in excess of a predetermined magnitude. Also included in a diverter coupled to the input, the output, the power-dissipating element and the detector. This diverter can receive the bias current and can, in response, redirect power at the input from the output to the power-dissipating element.

Abstract: The invention relates to a two step method of manufacturing a magnetically switchable magneto-optic element comprising compressed bismuth-containing garnet film of low anisotropy field value deposited on a monocrystalline gadolinium garnet substrate. The first step involves growing a compressed bismuth-containing garnet film having a growth and strain induced effective anisotropy field of about 3000 gauss or less on a monocrystalline gadolinium garnet substrate. The second step involves reducing the anisotropy field of the resulting garnet film to a predetermined lower anisotropy field by ion implantation.

Abstract: Incoming data from one of two data channels is coupled through a multiplexer to a ping pong memory. While data is being read into one section of the ping pong memory from the data processing equipment, it is being read out of the other side of the ping pong memory. Since part of the header information constitutes marks and spaces, i.e., groupings of all ones or all zeros, if a data word contains all ones, it could be misconstrued. Therefore, any data word which contains all ones is converted to a data word which is one bit less than all ones. Once this conditioning is done, of each group of 13 input words, each word representing a pixel and each word being ten bits long, the first, fifth, and ninth words are extracted using programmable logic arrays. The 30 bits obtained by this extraction are broken down and appended, in groups of three, to the existing bits of the remaining ten words of each group of 13 input words.

Abstract: A method of fabricating a controlled harmonic grating having both binary magnitude and phase transmissions in which specified harmonics are enhanced and/or suppressed. The summing of a number of binary pulse trains produces a controlled harmonic grating transmission function. The binary grating is readily fabricated by applying strips of light blocking material corresponding to the occurrence of a zero value of the transmission function, and by forming light-transmissive strips coincident with the portions of the transmission function having an absolute value of 1. Strips of phase retarding material are also deposited having a relative phase shift of pi radians.

Abstract: A silicon wafer is provided which does not employ individually bonded leads between the IR sensitive elements and the input stages of multiplexers. The wafer is first coated with lead selenide in a first detector array area and is thereafter coated with lead sulfide within a second detector array area. The described steps result in the direct chemical deposition of lead selenide and lead sulfide upon the silicon wafer to eliminate individual wire bonding, bumping, flip chipping, planar interconnecting methods of connecting detector array elements to silicon chip circuitry, e.g., multiplexers, to enable easy fabrication of very long arrays. The electrode structure employed, produces an increase in the electrical field gradient between the electrodes for a given volume of detector material, relative to conventional electrode configurations.

Abstract: A circuit is described in combination with a dielectric-resonator-stabilized oscillator operating at microwave frequencies in which a PIN diode serves to shunt the reflected output signal of the stabilizing resonator from the input of the oscillator circuit into a load to turn the oscillator off. By biasing the diode in a reverse or forward direction, the oscillator is made to start or stop oscillating, respectively. This has the effect of switching the output of the oscillator on and off while eliminating thermal transients associated with de-energizing the active element of the oscillator circuit itself, or the necessity for inefficient microwave switches which may pass some signal through.

Abstract: Groups of electromechanical actuators affixed to a movable mirror are coupled to the mirror along radial lines extending from the central portion thereof. The actuators in each of such groups have variable sensitivity of mechanical response per volt applied, such sensitivity increasing for each actuator which is positioned further and further away from the central portion, and thus for any desired motion, only one control voltage is required to drive all actuators in a particular group. Variable sensitivity is preferably attained by constructing all actuators to have the same number of piezo-electric layers and connecting more and more electrodes associated with the layers to the single control voltage for actuators positioned further and further away from the central portion of the optical element.

Abstract: A microscope, not employing conventional optical elements, is disclosed wherein a sample under examination is subjected to a moving pattern of illumination having alternate light and dark interference fringes, and having a spatial frequency which varies during the motion of the fringes over the sample in a first direction, in order to obtain the sine components of the optical image of the sample. The light reflected off of the sample is gathered by a wide angle light detector to produce electrical signals which in turn result in the recording of a set of signals proportional to the intensity of the light reflected from the sample during a plurality of signal sampling intervals. Another set of signals is recorded after the direction of relative motion between the pattern and the sample is changed by about 1.degree., for example, and so on until electrical data is recorded for a considerable number of "fourier slices" across the sample object.

Abstract: Apparatus for measuring the velocity of a moving image or object including a first array of sensors extending in a first direction transverse to image motion for sensing a primary set of image elements; a second array of sensors extending generally in the first direction and spaced a known distance from the first array for sensing successive sets of image elements; a device for correlating the primary set of image elements with each of the successive sets of image elements and for producing a correlation level indicating the level of correlation of the primary set with each of the successive sets; means for selecting one of the correlation levels which indicates an optimal level of correlation; and means for determining the time interval between the sensing of the first array of the primary set and the sensing by the second array of the successive set corresponding to the selected correlation level; in addition, the means for correlating may include means for comparing with the primary set each successive set

Abstract: An automatic printed wiring board (PWB) defect detector is described. The detector comprises an array of optical sensors for optically inspecting a printed wire circuit. The array forms a binary image pattern of the PWB which is tested for compliance with logical rules of correctly printed PWB's regarding unterminated conductors; minimum specified lined width; line spacing width; presence of insulators on conductors and vice versa; and maximum line width. The detector comprises a plurality of CCD arrays arranged to form a series of pixels consisting of electronic binary signals corresponding to the instantaneous image viewed by each element in the CCD array. These pixels are formed in an image data stream of sequential pixels line-by-line of the CCD array, i.e., pixel sequential line sequential digital image data. The digital pixel data is formatted in an "N" by "N" bit matrix of points in proper image orientation. All such points are available for sampling.