Earth-observing photonic integrated circuit (EPIC) science instrumentation

Máté Ádámkovics; Tony C. Kowalczyk

doi:10.1117/12.3028831

3 October 2024 Earth-observing photonic integrated circuit (EPIC) science instrumentation

Máté Ádámkovics, Tony C. Kowalczyk

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 13144, Infrared Remote Sensing and Instrumentation XXXII; 1314406 (2024) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3028831
Event: Optical Engineering + Applications, 2024, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

The Earth-observing Photonic Integrated Circuit (EPIC) Multispectral Aerosol Polarimeter (MAP) mission concept has been developed to investigate the properties of aerosol from a constellation of orbiting photonic sensors. Each sensor in the EPIC MAP constellation is an imaging spectropolarimeter that is sensitive to multiple wavelength bands from the visible through the infrared. The photonic sensor is a novel, compact, interferometric imager. Light is collected by millimeter-sized lenslets, which couple to waveguides in the photonic circuit, where signal phases and amplitudes are measured. Coupling into the device with waveguide-grating couplers is polarization selective. Pairs of lenslets form interferometer baselines that sample spatial frequencies in two dimensions for reconstructing images of the intensity distribution in the field of regard. Silicon nitride and lithium niobate structures are hybridized for a photonic device design that is compact, low-noise, and stable. Here we demonstrate the viability of the photonic sensor design by fabricating and characterizing the irreducible component of the photonic imager; that is, the set of photonic structures that are required to measure the amplitude, phase, and polarization state along an interferometer baseline. Imaging performance models are developed to demonstrate the spatial resolution of the device for a given lenslet distribution, with noise properties of the images determined by propagation of the uncertainties in the phase and amplitude measurements. These performance models can be used to detail the technical requirements of an imager that addresses the specific science objectives of the EPIC MAP mission concept.

Conference Presentation

(2024) Published by SPIE. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.

Citation Download Citation

Máté Ádámkovics and Tony C. Kowalczyk "Earth-observing photonic integrated circuit (EPIC) science instrumentation", Proc. SPIE 13144, Infrared Remote Sensing and Instrumentation XXXII, 1314406 (3 October 2024); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3028831

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