NASA engineers are improving lidar for space exploration and will test a suite of new laser technologies from an aircraft this summer for Earth science remote sensing. Called lidar, the instruments could also be used to improve models of the Moon’s shape and aid the search for Artemis landing sites.
If you are interested in the history of space lidar, read – Apollo 15 and the Birth of Space Lidar.
From an article by NASA.
Similar to sonar, but using light instead of sound, lidars calculate distances by timing how long a laser beam takes to reflect off a surface and return to an instrument. Multiple pings from the laser can provide the relative speed and even 3D image of a target. They increasingly help NASA scientists and explorers navigate, map, and collect scientific data.
Engineers and scientists at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, continue to refine lidars into smaller, lighter, more versatile tools for science and exploration, with help from hardware provided by small business and academic partners.
“Existing 3D-imaging lidars struggle to provide the 2-inch resolution needed by guidance, navigation and control technologies to ensure precise and safe landings essential for future robotic and human exploration missions,” team engineer Jeffrey Chen said. “Such a system requires 3D hazard-detection lidar and a navigation doppler lidar, and no existing system can perform both functions.”
Enter CASALS, the Concurrent Artificially intelligent Spectrometry and Adaptive Lidar System. Developed through Goddard’s IRAD, Internal Research and Development program, CASALS shines a tunable laser through a prism-like grating to spread the beam based on its changing wavelengths. Traditional lidars pulse a fixed-wavelength laser which is split into multiple beams by bulky mirrors and lenses to split it into multiple beams. One CASALS instrument could cover more of a planet’s surface in each pass than lidars used for decades to measure Earth, the Moon, and Mars.
CASALS’s smaller size, weight, and lower power requirements enable small satellite applications as well as handheld or portable lidars for use on the Moon’s surface, Goddard engineer and CASALS development lead Guangning Yang said.
The CASALS team received funding from NASA’s Earth Science Technology Office to test their improvements by airplane in 2024, bringing their system closer to spaceflight readiness.
For the complete article on improving lidar for space exploration CLICK HERE.
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