This PDF file contains the front matter associated with SPIE Proceedings Volume 8185, including the Title Page, Copyright information, Table of Contents, and the Conference Committee listing.

In 2009 the United States invested in defence R&T 3,6 times and in defence research and development 6,8 times as much as all member states of the European Defence Agency (EDA) combined while the ratio in the total defence expenditure was 2,6 in the US' favour. The European lack of investments in defence research and development has a negative impact on the competitiveness of European defence industry and on the European non-dependence. In addition, the efficiency of investment is reduced due to duplication of work in different member states. The Lisbon Treaty tasks EDA to support defence technology research, and coordinate and plan joint research activities and the study of technical solutions meeting future operational needs. This paper gives an overview how EDA meets the challenge of improving the efficiency of European defence R&T investment with an emphasis on electro-optics and describes shortly the ways that governmental and industrial partners can participate in the EDA cooperation. Examples of joint R&T projects addressing electro-optics are presented.

MCT technologies under development in France address strategic operational needs. This includes better identification range as well as lighter weight requirement, operation at higher detector temperature and cost reduction issues. This paper describes the status of MCT IR technology in France at Leti and Sofradir. A focus will be made on hot detector technology for SWAP applications. Solutions for high performance detectors such as dual bands or megapixels will be discussed. In the meantime, the development of avalanche photodiodes, integrated optics, or TV format with digital interface is key to bring customers cutting-edge functionalities.

Current development efforts in IR-module technology show two major trends: reducing size, weight and power (SWaP) of IR-systems and further increase of system performance by introducing 3rd Gen IR-modules. The key elements to reduce SWaP as well as cost while keeping high electro-optical performance are further reduction of pitch size, implementing compact and low power cooling engines and provide more cost-efficient production of detector arrays. In this paper latest results of IR-detectors (640x512, 15μm pitch) operating at high operation temperatures (HOT) are presented. HOT is the fundamental requirement for achieving above mentioned goals. For advanced reduction of SWaP AIM started the development of a full TV format detector array with 640x480 elements and 12μm pitch size. Megapixel detectors having e.g. 1280x1024 elements belong to next generation of IR-modules and are state-of-the-art choice for the demand of high performance applications for maximum possible spatial resolution. The development status of these large format 2-dimensional detector arrays at AIM will be shown in the paper.

This paper summarises measurements and calculations of HOT performance in Selex Galileo's MW detectors and demonstrates that high quality imagery can be achieved up to 175K. The benefits of HOT operation for cooler performance and power dissipation are also quantified. The variable band gap of MCT provides the ability to optimise the cut-off wavelength for a wide range of operating temperatures. In particular, it provides the means to produce a MW detector that is well matched to the 3-5μm atmospheric transmission window at any temperature in the range from 80K up to room temperature. Competing InSb technology is disadvantaged at higher operating temperatures by a narrowing band gap, increasing cut-off wavelength, and inadequate EO performance. The practical upper limit of operating temperature for near-background limited performance is influenced by several factors, which fall into two categories: the fundamental physics of thermal dark current generation and black body emission from the cooled radiation shield, and the technology limitations of MCT diode leakage currents, excess noise, dark current due to defects, and injection efficiency into the ROIC.

SWIR image sensors based on p-i-n photodiodes arrays present a tremendous interest in applications often requiring a high intra-scene dynamics. This paper describes a single-chip InGaAs SWIR camera with more than 120 dB intrinsic operational dynamic range with an innovative CMOS ROIC technology initially developed by New Imaging Technologies for visible CMOS camera chip. A simplified camera with on chip fixed pattern noise correction is presented. We also present the next generation of focal plane arrays (FPA) based on a VGA format of 640 x 512 pixels with a pitch of 15 μm. These FPAs are associated to a logarithmic wide dynamic range ROIC. We give the electro-optics performances and particularly the visible extension capabilities. This InGaAs VGA logarithmic single-chip camera allows a high resolution SWIR camera with minimized system complexity and low power consumption.

An uncooled microbolometer with peak responsivity in the long wave infrared region of the electromagnetic radiation is developed at Sensonor Technologies. It is a 384 x 288 focal plane array with a pixel pitch of 25μm, based on monocrystalline Si/SiGe quantum wells as IR sensitive material. The high sensitivity (TCR) and low 1/f noise are the main performance characteristics of the product. The frame rate is maximum 60Hz and the output interface is digital (LVDS). The quantum well thermistor material is transferred to the read-out integrated circuit (ROIC) by direct wafer bonding. The ROIC wafer containing the released pixels is bonded in vacuum with a silicon cap wafer, providing hermetic encapsulation at low cost. The resulting wafer stack is mounted in a standard ceramic package. In this paper the architecture of the pixels and the ROIC, the wafer packaging and the electro-optical measurement results are presented.

The thermal analysis (TA) of the wave propagation in the long-wave (LWIR) infrared bands, performed on metamaterials and nano-materials, is suitable for manufacturing a new type of infrared (IR) thermal vision camouflage, useful for defence, military and security application and to evaluate the capability of new kind of materials to block night vision (NV) thermal sighting capabilities as new countermeasure technology. This is mainly generated by the very detailed signature characterization database, available in most automatic vision systems that are able to detect targets by the IR spectral signature provided by the IR sensor. These metamaterials, called photonics band gap devices (PBG) or more in general photonic crystal (PhC), works on IR photons providing absorbing, transmission and reflecting bands. All the optical properties are function of the specific nano design tuned in the thermal wavelength.

Several organisations are currently developing concepts for multi-functional seekers which provide a passive imaging and a semi-active laser (SAL) imaging capability in the same focal plane array. The combination of the two functions in the same seeker has the promise of reducing costs by reducing the number of missile variants. The combination also allows new concepts of operations, for example handover between the two imaging modes during a mission. Performance of the SAL aspect relies on signal detection above both the detector noise and the solar clutter. Thus system specification is more complex than simply defining the sensitivity of the detector. Using parametric radiometric calculations, we propose a seeker Figure of Merit to take account of the solar clutter. The Figure of Merit could provide an additional specification to guarantee performance of the system. The requirement on the Figure of Merit is estimated for various engagement scenarios and conditions. The performance of the seekers, in this context, is evaluated using published and estimated values for the parameters.

This paper continues previous research work dealing with the study of sensor of thermal field disturbance. The utilization of polarization maintaining fiber (PMF) birefringence high sensitivity upon the temperature is taken in advantage. The effect of laser source wavelength and optical fiber beat length upon the fiber response invoked by disturbing temperature field is theoretically analyzed. The sensitivity of optical fiber response upon the temperature disturbing is experimentally verified. The optical fibers for wavelength 633 nm and 1550 nm with its beat length 2 mm and 5 mm are used in experiment. The experimental work was conducted for different lengths of disturbing temperature radiation sources from fiber-optic sensor and for different length of sensor exposed to the radiation. The relation of fiber response for the wavelength of 633 nm upon different magnitude of disturbing temperature radiation was also investigated. The particular results of experimental work are presented in this paper. The construction of sensor system with desired sensitivity and selection of its parameters can be done based on the obtained results.

We investigated the single shot output characteristics in the infrared region for single filaments in air. The infrared emission could be enhanced up to a few orders of magnitude by use of adaptive optics. Sensor dazzling effects were studied with different optical setups. Furthermore, a large variety of complex single shot emission patterns could be isolated. The detected emission of spiral patterns suggests the possibility of spiral propagation of laser light. To automatically optimize special emission patterns an evolutionary algorithm with noise suppression was designed.

It is a well-known fact that the major degradation source on EO imaging underwater is from scattering by the medium itself and the constituents within, namely particles of various origins and sizes. Recent research indicates that under certain conditions, such degradations could be caused mainly by the variations of index of refraction associated with temperature and salinity micro-structures in the ocean. These would inherently affect the optical signal transmission underwater, which is of vital interest to both civilian and military applications, as they could include diver visibility, search and rescue, mine detection and identification, and optical communication. The impacts from the optical turbulence are yet fully understood, in part due to the challenges associated with parameterization of individual factors. This study presents the initial attempts in quantifying the level of EO image degradation due to optical turbulence in natural waters, in terms of modulation transfer functions, and enhancements using the lucky patch approaches derived from optical flow techniques. Image data collected from natural environments during SOTEX (Skaneateles Optical Turbulence Exercise, July 22-31, 2010) using the Image Measurement Assembly for Subsurface Turbulence (IMAST) are presented. Optical properties of the water column were measured using WETLab's ac-9 and LISST (Laser In Situ Scattering and Transmissiometry), in coordination with temperature, conductivity and depth. Turbulence conditions were measured by two different approaches, namely a 3D Doppler based velocimeter with Conductivity/Temperature combo, and a shear based Vertical Microstructure Profiler.

The Second Generation Locator for Urban Search and Rescue Operations (SGL for USaR) is an EC-funded project solving critical problems following massive destruction and large scale structural collapses in urban locations. One part of the project is the development of a standalone portable first responder device (FIRST) for the operational rescue teams. It will combine field chemical analysis, spectral analysis with audio and video analysis capabilities for the early location of entrapped people, the detection of buried people and air quality monitoring in confined spaces for ensuring safety and security of first responders. Hardware selected for the optical sensors of the FIRST-device will be responsible for the fluorescence, visible (VIS), near infrared (NIR) and long wavelength infrared (LWIR) range detection as well as supplying required illumination. FIRST shall identify images of fires or other events, damage patterns, temperature of living humans, motion of body parts and human postures. The device requirements were based on the operational input and feedback received from European rescue teams - partners within the project (final product end-users). Some of the critical properties for the selected components were compact physical size, low power consumption, refresh rate and adequate resolution of the sensor image data. During the project, special image libraries were collected and suitable image processing algorithms based on the collected data were developed.

The rapid developments in the laser field through the last years led to very compact laser devices with high brightness. In the visual and near infrared spectral range practically each wavelength is now available. For optronical sensors, laser radiation states an increasing threat that cannot be encountered just by conventional safety measures like absorption or interference filters. We present a concept to protect imaging sensors against laser radiation of any wavelength. The system is based on the combination of a spatial light modulator and wavelength multiplexing and allows selective spectral filtering in a defined region of interest in the scene. Such a system offers the possibility to suppress annoying laser radiation without losing spatial information in the region of interest. Depending on the used imaging sensor, we discuss different ways to realize a control loop to activate the appropriate pixels of the spatial light modulator for the attenuation of the laser light.

An increasing number of electro-optical systems are being used by pilots in tactical aircraft. This means that the afore mentioned systems must operate through the aircrafts canopy, unfortunately the canopy functions as a less than ideal lens element in the electro-optical sensor optical path. The canopy serves first and foremost as an aircraft structural component, considerations like minimizing the drag co-efficient and the ability to survive bird strikes take precedence over achieving optimal optical characteristics. This paper describes how the authors characterized the optical characteristics of an aircraft canopy. Families of modulation transfer functions were generated, for various viewing geometries through the canopy and for various electro-optical system entrance pupil diameters. These functions provided us with the means to significantly reduce the effect of the canopy "lens" on the performance of a representative electro-optical system, using an Astigmatic Corrector Lens. A comparison of the electro-optical system performance with and without correction is also presented.

The article presents the concept of network-centric conformal electro-optical systems construction with spherical field of view. It discusses abstract passive distributed electro-optical systems with focal array detectors based on a group of moving objects distributed in space. The system performs conformal processing of information from sensor matrix in a single event coordinate-time field. Unequivocally the construction of the systems which satisfy the different criteria of optimality is very complicated and requires special approaches to their development and design. The paper briefly touches upon key questions (in the authors' opinion) in the synthesis of such systems that meet different criteria of optimality. The synthesis of such systems is discussed by authors with the systematic and synergy approaches.

Work is focused on study of capability of solid Schmidt camera to serve as a wide-field infrared lens for aircraft system with whole sphere coverage, working in 8-14 um spectral range, coupled with spherical focal array of megapixel class. Designs of 16 mm f/0.2 lens with 60 and 90 degrees sensor diagonal are presented, their image quality is compared with conventional solid design. Achromatic design with significantly improved performance, containing enclosed soft correcting lens behind protective front lens is proposed. One of the main goals of the work is to estimate benefits from curved detector arrays in 8-14 um spectral range wide-field systems. Coupling of photodetector with solid Schmidt camera by means of frustrated total internal reflection is considered, with corresponding tolerance analysis. The whole lens, except front element, is considered to be cryogenic, with solid Schmidt unit to be flown by hydrogen for improvement of bulk transmission.

ABB Bomem has recently designed a field-deployable reflectometer. The Full Spectrum Reflectometer (FSR) measures the diffuse reflectance of surfaces in the 0.7 μm to 13.5 μm spectral range. The spectral resolution is adjustable from 32 to 4 cm^-1. The instrument is portable, battery-operated and designed for field usage in a single, lightweight and ruggedized package. In its simplest mode, the instrument is automated and can be operated by non-specialist personnel with minimal training. The FSR has a laboratory mode to measure targets brought to the instrument in a sampling cup and a field mode with automated measurement sequence. To facilitate the measurement of various ground surfaces, the instrument is packaged in a three-point mount for easy target access and stability. One of the mount is the sampling port. The instrument has its own built-in NIR and LWIR infrared sources to illuminate the ground area to be measured. The instrument includes two built-in references for calibration: a Spectralon diffuser and an Infragold diffuser. The first units were commissioned to build a spectral database of surfaces in various conditions (humidity, temperature, texture, mixing, etc.) and in the presence of interfering chemicals (oils, solvents, etc.) but the instrument can also serve other purposes such as the identification of unknown materials.

U.S. Army Dugway Proving Ground (DPG) is a Major Range and Test Facility Base (MRTFB) with the mission of testing chemical and biological defense systems and materials. DPG facilities include state-of-the-art laboratories, extensive test grids, controlled environment calibration facilities, and a variety of referee instruments for required test measurements. Among these referee instruments, DPG has built up a significant remote sensing capability for both chemical and biological detection. Technologies employed for remote sensing include FTIR spectroscopy, UV spectroscopy, Raman-shifted eye-safe lidar, and other elastic backscatter lidar systems. These systems provide referee data for bio-simulants, chemical simulants, toxic industrial chemicals (TICs), and toxic industrial materials (TIMs). In order to realize a successful large scale open-air test, each type of system requires calibration and characterization. DPG has developed specific calibration facilities to meet this need. These facilities are the Joint Ambient Breeze Tunnel (JABT), and the Active Standoff Chamber (ASC). The JABT and ASC are open ended controlled environment tunnels. Each includes validation instrumentation to characterize simulants that are disseminated. Standoff systems are positioned at typical field test distances to measure characterized simulants within the tunnel. Data from different types of systems can be easily correlated using this method, making later open air test results more meaningful. DPG has a variety of large scale test grids available for field tests. After and during testing, data from the various referee instruments is provided in a visual format to more easily draw conclusions on the results. This presentation provides an overview of DPG's standoff testing facilities and capabilities, as well as example data from different test scenarios.

A wavelet-modified frequency domain Optimal Trade-off Maximum Average Correlation Height (OT-MACH) filter has been trained using 3D CAD models and tested on real target images acquired from a Forward Looking Infra Red (FLIR) sensor. The OT-MACH filter can be used to detect and discriminate predefined targets from a cluttered background. The FLIR sensor extends the filter's ability by increasing the range of detection by exploiting the heat signature differences between the target and the background. A Difference of Gaussians (DoG) based wavelet filter has been use to improve the OT-MACH filter discrimination ability and distortion tolerance. Choosing the right standard deviation values of the two Gaussians comprising the filter is critical. In this paper we present a new technique for auto adjustment of the DoG filter parameters driven by the expected target size. Tests were carried on images acquired by the Apache AH-64 helicopter mounted FLIR sensor, results showing an overall improvement in the recognition of target objects present within the IR images.

Acquisition and classification of moving objects in imaging through long-distance atmospheric path (more than 1-2 km) may be affected by distortions such as blur and spatiotemporal movements caused by air turbulence. These distortions are more meaningful when the size of the objects is relatively small (for instance, few pixels width). This work aims to study and quantify the effects of these distortions on the ability to classify small moving objects in atmosphericallydegraded video signals. For this purpose, moving objects were extracted from real video signals recorded through longdistance atmospheric path. Then, various geometrical and textural object features were extracted, and reduced to two principle components using principle component analysis (PCA). The effect of the atmospheric distortion on object classification was examined using support vector machine (SVM) classifier. Furthermore, the influence of image restoration on the classification performances was examined for the real-degraded videos. Results show how classification performances are decreasing when the images are degraded by the atmospheric path compared to the case where successful image restoration is performed.

Ability to image underwater is highly desired for scientific and military applications, including optical communications, submarine awareness, diver visibility, and mine detection. Underwater imaging is severely impaired by scattering and optical turbulence associated with refraction index fluctuations. This work introduces novel approach to restoration of degraded underwater imagery based on multi-frame correction technique developed for atmospheric distortions. The method represents synthesis of "lucky-region" fusion and optical flow based image warping. Developed multi-frame image restoration algorithm is applied to sets of images collected in laboratory under controlled conditions as well as field test data. Reliance of image restoration on sophistication of the optical flow algorithm is shown. Variable degrees of image degradation mitigation which manifest themselves as high spatial frequency content recovery are demonstrated depending on imaging conditions and ratio of typical image spatial frequency scale to typical degradation spatial frequency scale.

Moving target tracking in an infrared (IR) image sequence under high clutter and noise power has been recently under intensive investigation, and the track-before-detect (TBD) technique based-on dynamic programming (DP) is known to be especially attractive in very low SNR environments (3dB). In this paper we present a novel 3- dimensioanl(3D) TBD-DP technique using multiple IR image sensors. Our approach, which does not require a separate image registration step, uses the pixel intensity values read off jointly from multiple image frames, to compute the merit function value required in the DP process. To overcome the computation burden related with the 3D TBD-DP process, we also propose a novel technique that progressively changes the resolution or the level-of-detail (LOD) of the image. And we analysis the detection performance of these algorithm, detection probability P_d and false alarm probability P_FA. Our simulation results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm has good track detection performance with the computation load of less than an order of magnitude compared with the straight-forward 3D TBD-DP, not employing the LOD technique.

The technology of aircraft recognition and tracking has various applications in all areas of air navigation, be they civil or military, spanning from air traffic control and regulation at civilian airports to anti-aircraft weapon handling and guidance for military purposes.^{1, 18} The system presented in this thesis is an alternative implementation of identifying and tracking flying objects, which benefits from the optical spectrum by using an optical camera built into a servo motor (pan-tilt unit). More specifically, through the purpose-developed software, when a target (aircraft) enters the field of view of the camera¹⁸, it is both detected and identified.^{5, 22} Then the servo motor, being provided with data on target position and velocity, tracks the aircraft while it is in constant communication with the camera (Fig. 1). All the features are so designed as to operate under real time conditions.

SIFT tracking algorithm is an excellent point-based tracking algorithm, which has high tracking performance and accuracy due to its robust capability against rotation, scale change and occlusion. However, when tracking a huge 3D target in complicated real scenarios in a forward-looking infrared (FLIR) image sequence taken from an airborne moving platform, the tracked point locating in the vertical surface usually shifts away from the correct position. In this paper, we propose a novel algorithm for 3D target tracking in FLIR image sequences. Our approach uses SIFT keypoints detected in consecutive frames for point correspondence. The candidate position of the tracked point is firstly estimated by computing the affine transformation using local corresponding SIFT keypoints. Then the correct position is located via an optimal method. Euclidean distances between a candidate point and SIFT keypoints nearby are calculated and formed into a SIFT-based distance histogram. The distance histogram is defined a cost of associating each candidate point to a correct tracked point using the constraint based on the topology of each candidate point with its surrounding SIFT keypoints. Minimization of the cost is formulated as a combinatorial optimization problem. Experiments demonstrate that the proposed algorithm efficiently improves the tracking performance and accuracy.

To measure a level of a flammable liquid, optical sensing methods have been reported more effective than other methods based on mechanical and electrical methods. This paper reports a new method that uses a collimator and a pipe to measure the liquid level. The presented liquid-level sensor consists of a gradient-index lens (GRIN lens), a metal pipe with small holes, and a floating buoy as a mirror. The liquid in the tank flows into the pipe through small holes and the floating buoy coated with aluminum will float over the liquid. The light collimated by a GRIN lens will be reflected at the floating buoy, which operates like mirror. The light reflected from the mirror is refocused through the GRIN lens and is varied as a function of the liquid distance. It is a simple design using a pipe to collect easily the. The experimental result was obtained using a pipe with the height of 2 m and width of 10 mm. The power loss was decreased with the ratio of 30 dB/m. This low-cost configuration easily collects the reflected light from the liquid surface without complicated aligning.

Protection of naval bases and harbors requires close co-operation between security and access control systems covering land areas and those monitoring sea approach routes. The typical location of naval bases and harbors - usually next to a large city - makes it difficult to detect and identify a threat in the dense regular traffic of various sea vessels (i.e. merchant ships, fishing boats, tourist ships). Due to the properties of vessel control systems, such as AIS (Automatic Identification System), and the effectiveness of radar and optoelectronic systems against different targets it seems that fast motor boats called RIB (Rigid Inflatable Boat) could be the most serious threat to ships and harbor infrastructure. In the paper the process and conditions for the detection and identification of high-speed boats in the areas of ports and naval bases in the near, medium and far infrared is presented. Based on the results of measurements and recorded thermal images the actual temperature contrast delta T (RIB / sea) will be determined, which will further allow to specify the theoretical ranges of detection and identification of the RIB-type targets for an operating security system. The data will also help to determine the possible advantages of image fusion where the component images are taken in different spectral ranges. This will increase the probability of identifying the object by the multi-sensor security system equipped additionally with the appropriate algorithms for detecting, tracking and performing the fusion of images from the visible and infrared cameras.

The increasing range of naval engagements results in development of camouflages applied on warships that mask their signatures first in visible and next in and IR spectra. Camouflage applied on warships that mask their IR signatures is one of the most basic countermeasure methods against attacks by heat-seeking missiles. A set of special coatings applied to the ship's hull allows misidentification by enemies weapon and so make the ship harder to destroy. Thus the knowledge on actual thermal contrast between the ship and surrounding background is required in order to provide an effective antimissile defense. The paper presents selected aspects related to ship's camouflage realized by altering its thermal signature as well as the results of radiometric measurement of thermal radiation of IR-masking coatings. Measurements were performed using IR imaging spectrometers in near, medium and far infrared spectra. The presented measurement results constitute the basis for the assessment of the effectiveness of IR masking methods and additionally provide the opportunity to effectively simulate the properties of masking coatings and further to optimize their radiometric properties in the infrared range.

Most of airborne cameras usually have two actuation axes(roll and pitch) to stabilize and point LOS(Line Of Sight) to a desirable direction. This two-axis structure makes LOS become vulnerable to angular rate disturbance around yaw(heading) axis of aircraft and allows camera to obtain images of only strip vicinity of target instead of rectangular coverage around the target even in moderate pitch lead/lag angle direction. These shortcomings, however, can be supplemented through the implementation of proper LOS scanning scheme suggested in this paper. Airborne EO/IR camera(AEI) is designed to obtain images of large area. Generation of pitch reference angular rate command considering predetermined trace of LOS projected on target(earth surface) and rotation of LOS from LL(Local Level) to gimbal coordinates can make sure LOS to scan properly. Simulation results show that the new scanning scheme ensures robust scanning even under aircraft heading disturbances and lead/lag pitch angle direction. This paper describes the new scanning scheme along with overall but brief introduction to the system formation of AEI, as well as simulation which enables us to verify and assess the effectiveness of the new scanning scheme.

This paper describes the way to design an embedded network infrared video monitoring system based on Linux OS. Firstly, we make a comparison of the hardware solution between some regular monitoring systems, and then design the hardware system that we needed. Our hardware system uses the i.mx27 processor with the ARM9 core. Secondly, the software platform is introduced in this paper. The Linux operate system is applied in our software solution. According to the characteristic of Linux OS, we download uboot to the demo board, transplant the Linux kernel and jffs2 file system to the embedded system, and briefly compile and download drivers. Finally, the application software design process is introduced in the paper. The system can be used to encode the picture captured from infrared CCD, and then send the picture to another same embedded system to decode the picture, and finally display it on the LCD and achieve the goal of the infrared video's remote monitoring. As the infrared CCD would not be affect by the dim light, this monitoring system could be used all day long.