Adaptive beam control based on return statistics: laboratory real-time simulation

Laser pointing systems suffer from random errors and biases causing off-axis pointing and loss of signal at the target. Often sensors are not available at the target location to provide pointing related information. The present paper outlines a novel technique to adaptively control the beam pointing real-time based on boresight estimates obtained using the statistics of the reflected signal from the target, thus eliminating the need of beam position sensors at the target. A field realization of this technique is discussed. Also a laboratory arrangement that works successfully on this approach is demonstrated.