A time-of-flight camera (ToF camera), also known as time-of-flight sensor (ToF sensor), is a range imaging camera system for measuring distances between the camera and the subject for each point of the image based on time-of-flight, the round trip time of an artificial light signal, as provided by a laser or an LED. Laser-based time-of-flight cameras are part of a broader class of scannerless LIDAR, in which the entire scene is captured with each laser pulse, as opposed to point-by-point with a laser beam such as in scanning LIDAR systems.Time-of-flight camera products for civil applications began to emerge around 2000, as the semiconductor processes allowed the production of components fast enough for such devices. The systems cover ranges of a few centimeters up to several kilometers.
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LIDAR in the context of Starfire Optical Range
Starfire Optical Range (SOR - Pronounced as an initialism) is a United States Air Force research laboratory on the Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Its primary duty, according to the official website, is to "develop and demonstrate optical wavefront control technologies." The range is a secure lab facility and is a division of the Directed Energy Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory.
SOR's optical equipment includes a 3.5 meter telescope which is "one of the largest telescopes in the world equipped with adaptive optics designed for satellite tracking" according to the Air Force, a 1.5 meter telescope, and a 1-meter beam director.
LIDAR in the context of Sodium layer
The sodium layer is a layer of neutral atoms of sodium within Earth's mesosphere. This layer usually lies within an altitude range of 80–105 km (50–65 mi) above sea level and has a depth of about 5 km (3.1 mi). The sodium comes from the ablation of meteors. Atmospheric sodium below this layer is normally chemically bound in compounds such as sodium oxide, while the sodium atoms above the layer tend to be ionized.
The density varies with season; the average column density (the number of atoms per unit area above any point on the Earth's surface) is roughly 4 billion sodium atoms/cm. For a typical thickness of 5Â km this corresponds to volume density of roughly 8000 sodium atoms/cm.