Paper
17 July 2000 Recent developments in uncooled IR technology
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
Sanders IR Imaging Systems (IRIS), a Lockheed Martin Company, has made recent improvements in high performance uncooled IR focal plane arrays and systems. This paper provides performance results for three of these new FPAs and systems. First we discuss a new 320 X 240, 46 micrometer pitch FPA, which when put into a system with a transmission of 74%, will provide a system NETD of < 26 mK (F/0.8, 60 Hz). This FPA has a power of < 250 mW (which includes on-chip 14 bit analog to digital conversion), and virtually no crosstalk from saturation. Second, we discuss the first ever 640 X 480 element uncooled IR camera. This camera, which is based on a 28 micrometer pitch microbolometer staring FPA, produces a system sensitivity of < 150 mK, (F/1, 30 Hz) and has a Minimum Resolvable Temperature Difference of < 0.4 degrees Celsius at the Nyquist frequency. Finally, we have developed a new lightweight thermal weapons sight (TWS). Our TWS, which weighs < 3 lbs. (with battery) and operates over the -37 degrees Celsius to +49 degrees Celsius temperature range, has demonstrated a boresight retention of < 0.2 mrad after 1000's of rounds were fired.
© (2000) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Robert Murphy, Margaret Kohin, Brian S. Backer, Neal R. Butler, Richard J. Blackwell, and Thomas Allen "Recent developments in uncooled IR technology", Proc. SPIE 4028, Infrared Detectors and Focal Plane Arrays VI, (17 July 2000); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.391725
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Cited by 10 scholarly publications.
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KEYWORDS
Staring arrays

Cameras

IRIS Consortium

Thermal weapon sites

Imaging systems

Minimum resolvable temperature difference

Infrared imaging

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