High-resolution imaging through strong atmospheric turbulence and over wide fields-of-view

摘要

We use numerical simulations to study the prospective performance of a dual channel imaging system for observing space-based targets through strong atmospheric turbulence: one channel of the system employs aperture diversity and the other an imaging Shack-Hartmann wave-front sensor. The raw images acquired by this setup are processed using a blind restoration algorithm that captures the inherent temporal correlations in the observed phases. This approach, which strengthens the synergy between the image acquisition and post-processing steps, shows strong potential for providing high-resolution imagery at high levels of atmospheric turbulence. The approach may also allow for the separation of the phase perturbations from different layers of the atmosphere and offers promise for accurate restoration of images with fields of view substantially larger than the isoplanatic angle.