Tracking system for photon-counting laser radar

Thesis (M. Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2007.Includes bibliographical references (p. 107).The purpose of this thesis is to build the tracking system for a photon-counting laser radar specifically a laser radar that has the ability to perform direct and coherent detection measurement at low signal levels with common laser, optics and detector hardware. The heart of the tracking algorithm is a Kalman filter, and optimal Kalman filter parameters are determined using software simulations. The tracking algorithm was tested against various simulated (software only) and emulated (with actual hardware) trajectories. We also built and tested the real-time tracking system hardware. The algorithms and methods proposed in this thesis achieve the objective of tracking a target at 1,500 km range to within 1-cm accuracy.by Joshua TsuKang Chang.M.Eng