Spectral Broadening Effects on Pulsed-Source Digital Holography

Abstract

Using a pulsed configuration, a digital-holographic system is setup in the off-axis image plane recording geometry, and spectral broadening via pseudo-random bit sequence is used to degrade the temporal coherence of the master-oscillator laser. The associated effects on the signal-to-noise ratio are then measured in terms of the ambiguity and coherence efficiencies. It is found that the ambiguity efficiency, which is a function of signal-reference pulse overlap, is not affected by the effects of spectral broadening. The coherence efficiency, on the other hand, is affected. As a result, the coherence efficiency, which is a function of effective fringe visibility, is shown to be a valid performance metric for pulsed-source digital holography.

Aero-optical effects, part I. System-level considerations: tutorial

“…The accuracy of this estimate in terms of the signal-to-noise ratio has been the subject of several recent studies for both continuous-wave [71][72][73] and pulsed [74][75][76] operation. With the use of a strong-reference beam, the DHWFS also enables a shot-noise-limited detection regime [77].…”