Pseudo-random noise-continuous-wave laser radar for surface and cloud measurements

Laser radar (lidar) application may require an instrument with compact size, long life of the components, low consumption and eye-safety. One possibility to achieve these features is to use a continuous-wave (cw) diode laser as lidar transmitter. A practical way to perform range-resolved measurements with a cw laser diode is the pseudo-random noise (PRN) modulation. This paper presents a compact PRN-cw lidar, using a 370-mW cw diode laser and an APD as detector. Daytime measurements of cloud base and topographic surface are demonstrated with the PRN-cw lidar technique, where the range detection exceeds 2 km. The detection of the topographic surface is performed with integration time of some tens of milliseconds during daytime and some tens of microseconds during night-time.