Williams R E, von Bieren K
Appl Opt. 1971 Jun 1;10(6):1386-92. doi: 10.1364/AO.10.001386.
A coherent optical system design is proposed for simultaneously heterodyning, correlating, and beam forming on a large number of input channels. Techniques are described with application to two- as well as one-dimensional arrays. To accommodate the former, one direction in the optical aperture must serve both as a time and space dimension. The particular technique proposed resolves the apparent ambiguity. The method uses the phase of the correlation amplitude, after heterodyning, to effect the beam forming operation. Although the full theoretical correlation processing gain against background noise is not realized, very substantial gains and fine time and angle resolutions can be achieved. Because of its inherent physical simplicity, particularly as contrasted with electronic methods of similar capacity, the coherent optical correlator-beam former has significant advantages for many applications.
提出了一种相干光学系统设计，用于在大量输入通道上同时进行外差检测、相关处理和波束形成。描述了适用于一维和二维阵列的技术。为了适应二维阵列，光孔径中的一个方向必须同时用作时间维和空间维。所提出的特定技术解决了明显的模糊性。该方法利用外差检测后相关幅度的相位来实现波束形成操作。虽然没有实现针对背景噪声的完整理论相关处理增益，但可以实现非常可观的增益以及精细的时间和角度分辨率。由于其固有的物理简单性，特别是与具有类似容量的电子方法相比，相干光学相关器 - 波束形成器在许多应用中具有显著优势。
