Tech Briefs Magazine - October 2021 - 30

Imaging
other transmitters and produce enough
information to build an image.
The transmitting antennas operated at
frequencies from 200 megahertz to 10
gigahertz, roughly the upper half of the
radio spectrum, which includes micro -
waves. The receiver consisted of two an -
tennas connected to a signal digitizer. The
digitized data were transferred to a laptop
computer and uploaded to the graphics
processing unit to reconstruct the images.
The team used the method to reconstruct
a scene with 1.5 billion samples per second,
a corresponding image frame rate of
366 kilohertz (frames per second). By
comparison, this is about 100 to 1,000
times more frames per second than a cellphone
video camera.
With 12 antennas, the system generated
4096-pixel images with a resolution of
about 10 centimeters across a 10-meter
scene. This image resolution can be useful
when sensitivity or privacy is a concern.
The resolution could be improved
by upgrading the system using existing
technology including more transmitting
antennas and faster random signal generators
and digitizers. In the future, the
images could be improved by using
quantum entanglement, in which the
properties of individual radio signals
would become interlinked.
Illustration of the lab setup for m-Widar, with transmitters and receiver at left and a person behind
the wallboard at right. Inset at lower right shows the corresponding image produced by the instrument.
(Credit: NIST)
The new imaging technique could
also be adapted to transmit visible
light instead of radio signals - ultrafast
lasers could boost image resolution
but would lose the capability to
penetrate walls - or sound waves used
for sonar and ultrasound imaging
applications. In addition to imaging of
emergency conditions and space de -
bris, the new method might also be
used to measure the velocity of shock
waves, a key metric for evaluating ex -
plosives, and to monitor vital signs
such as heart rate and respiration.
For more information, contact Laura Ost
at laura.ost@nist.gov; 303-497-4880.
High-Resolution, Continuous Field-of-View, Non-Rotating
Imaging System
Applications include planetary exploration and imaging systems used in surveillance,
navigation, and target recognition.
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California
ASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory de -
veloped an imaging system suitable
for use in a periscope head that yields a
non-rotating 360-degree view of the surrounding
environment. With conventional
periscopes, the in stantaneous field of
view (FOV) is limited by the entrance
aperture, so the user sees an apparent tunnel.
Wide-angle coverage has been at -
tempted using multiple imagers but stateof-the-art
systems cannot simultaneously
provide narrow- and wide-FOV scene visualization.
N
The
imaging system improves upon
these systems by using multiple camera
arrays, each of which encloses a combination
of wide-FOV imagers and narrowFOV
imagers. Because this imaging system
displays a full 360-degree seamless FOV
and allows the user to select re gions for
higher-resolution inspection, it can simul30
Cov
taneously
carry out a number of diverse
visual tasks including surveillance, visionbased
navigation, automatic target recognition,
and tracking.
The high-resolution complementary
metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) im -
aging system comprises two major elements:
a sensor head for scene acquisition
and a control apparatus with distributed
processors and software for device
control, data handling, and display.
The sensor head is configured as a
cylinder suitable for use on the existing
mast of conventional periscopes and has
seven decks. Each deck encloses a combination
of wide-FOV CMOS imagers and
narrow-FOV CMOS imagers. The control
apparatus includes four TZI processors,
one FFI processor, one host processor,
and an optional automatic target recognition
(ATR) processor for high-speed,
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ToC
high-precision target detection, identification,
and tracking.
The image processing and system-level
control electronics are instantiated in six
conventional PC104 stacks (one for each
processor) and contained in a 10 × 50 × 20cm
housing with a footprint approximately
the size of a laptop computer. The display
system is a computer workstation hosting
an interactive graphical user interface
that allows the user to exercise all of the
operational states of the system (e.g.,
search, tracking, display, etc.).
NASA is actively seeking licensees to commercialize
this technology. Please contact
NASA's Licensing Concierge at Agency-PatentLicensing@mail.nasa.gov
or call us at 202358-7432
to initiate licensing discussions.
Follow this link for more information:
https://technology.nasa.gov/patent/NPOTOPS-31.
Tech
Briefs, October 2021

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Tech Briefs Magazine - October 2021

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