Monodimensional enlargement of resolved field of view in line scan cameras by a single doubly symmetric mirror

Abstract

The geometry of the sensed and thus optically relevant area in the image plane of line scan cameras suggests that improvement of the overall system is possible, by joint design of optics and electronics. By a technique named Linear Fovea (LF) proposed in this paper, the optical contrast along the Line-of-Interest (LOI) in the image plane i.e. the location of the opto-electronic sensor, is optimized at the expense of contrast elsewhere. In the LF method, employing a single doubly symmetric surface, the resolved field of view (RFOV) as the merit function, is maximized, by finding appropriate Zernike coefficients describing that surface. The technique is applied on a proof-of-concept single mirror telescope and both MTF analysis and standard target imaging simulation are performed. Results show that by this technique, the RFOV can be doubled, or alternatively the illumination can be increased 2.5 times keeping RFOV unchanged. Furthermore, a rather uniform response is kept along the LOI.