LWIR thermal imaging through dust obscuration
Abstract
The physical model for long wave infrared (LWIR) thermal imaging through a dust obscurant incorporates transmission loss as well as an additive path radiance term, both of which are dependent on an obscurant density along the imaging path. When the obscurant density varies in time and space, the desired signal is degraded by two anti-correlated atmospheric noise components-the transmission (multiplicative) and the path radiance (additive)-which are not accounted for by a single transmission parameter. This research introduces an approach to modeling the performance impact of dust obscurant variations. Effective noise terms are derived for obscurant variations detected by a sensor via a forward radiometric analysis of the imaging context. The noise parameters derived here provide a straightforward approach to predicting imager performance with existing NVESD models such as NVThermIP. © 2011 SPIE.
Publication Title
Proceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering
Recommended Citation
Smith, F., Jacobs, E., Chari, S., & Brooks, J. (2011). LWIR thermal imaging through dust obscuration. Proceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering https://doi.org/10.1117/12.884351
