Patent attributes
A method of finding a temporal location of a reflected pulse in a system for remotely measuring characteristics of a target scene. The method includes steps of: (a) transmitting a pulse burst of two or more pulses toward the target scene; (b) capturing a copy of the pulse burst transmitted in step (a); (c) measuring an inter-pulse separation between at least two pulses in the pulse burst captured in step (b); (d) receiving a signal reflected from the target scene; (e) determining a temporal location of a first pulse in the signal received in step (d); and (f) determining a temporal location of a second pulse in the signal received in step (d) based on the inter-pulse separation measured in step (c). Step (a) may include transmitting an OFF-line pulse and at least one ON-line pulse in the pulse burst toward the target scene from a differential absorption LIDAR (DIAL) system, where the OFF-line pulse and the ON-line pulse are combined pulses, each individually generated from a separate pulsed laser transmitter and each having a different wavelength.
