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Ranging
Length measurement, distance measurement, or range measurement (ranging) refers to the many ways in which length, distance, or range can be measured. The most commonly used approaches are the rulers, followed by transit-time methods and the interferometer methods based upon the speed of light. For objects such as crystals and diffraction gratings, diffraction is used with X-rays and electron beams. Measurement techniques for three-dimensional structures very small in every dimension use specialized instruments such as ion microscopy coupled with intensive computer modeling. Standard rulers The ruler the simplest kind of length measurement tool: lengths are defined by printed marks or engravings on a stick. The metre was initially defined using a ruler before more accurate methods became available. Gauge blocks are a common method for precise measurement or calibration of measurement tools. For small or microscopic objects, microphotography where the length is calibrat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Global Positioning System
The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a satellite-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Space Force. It is one of the global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) that provides geolocation and time information to a GPS receiver anywhere on or near the Earth where there is an unobstructed line of sight to four or more GPS satellites. It does not require the user to transmit any data, and operates independently of any telephonic or Internet reception, though these technologies can enhance the usefulness of the GPS positioning information. It provides critical positioning capabilities to military, civil, and commercial users around the world. Although the United States government created, controls and maintains the GPS system, it is freely accessible to anyone with a GPS receiver. The GPS project was started by the U.S. Department of Defense in 1973. The first prototype spacecraft wa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Corner Cube
A corner reflector is a retroreflector consisting of three mutually perpendicular, intersecting flat surfaces, which reflects waves directly towards the source, but translated. The three intersecting surfaces often have square shapes. Radar corner reflectors made of metal are used to reflect radio waves from radar sets. Optical corner reflectors, called corner cubes or cube corners, made of three-sided glass prisms, are used in surveying and laser ranging. Principle The incoming ray is reflected three times, once by each surface, which results in a reversal of direction. To see this, the three corresponding normal vectors of the corner's perpendicular sides can be considered to form a basis (a rectangular coordinate system) (''x'', ''y'', ''z'') in which to represent the direction of an arbitrary incoming ray, . When the ray reflects from the first side, say ''x'', the ray's ''x'' component, ''a'', is reversed to −''a'' while the ''y'' and ''z'' components are uncha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
LIDAR
Lidar (, also LIDAR, or LiDAR; sometimes LADAR) is a method for determining ranges (variable distance) by targeting an object or a surface with a laser and measuring the time for the reflected light to return to the receiver. It can also be used to make digital 3-D representations of areas on the Earth's surface and ocean bottom of the intertidal and near coastal zone by varying the wavelength of light. It has terrestrial, airborne, and mobile applications. ''Lidar'' is an acronym of "light detection and ranging" or "laser imaging, detection, and ranging". It is sometimes called 3-D laser scanning, a special combination of 3-D scanning and laser scanning. Lidar is commonly used to make high-resolution maps, with applications in surveying, geodesy, geomatics, archaeology, geography, geology, geomorphology, seismology, forestry, atmospheric physics, laser guidance, airborne laser swath mapping (ALSM), and laser altimetry. It is also used in control and navigation for som ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Speed Of Light
The speed of light in vacuum, commonly denoted , is a universal physical constant that is important in many areas of physics. The speed of light is exactly equal to ). According to the special theory of relativity, is the upper limit for the speed at which conventional matter or energy (and thus any signal carrying information) can travel through space. All forms of electromagnetic radiation, including visible light, travel at the speed of light. For many practical purposes, light and other electromagnetic waves will appear to propagate instantaneously, but for long distances and very sensitive measurements, their finite speed has noticeable effects. Starlight viewed on Earth left the stars many years ago, allowing humans to study the history of the universe by viewing distant objects. When communicating with distant space probes, it can take minutes to hours for signals to travel from Earth to the spacecraft and vice versa. In computing, the speed of light fixes th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Radar
Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. A radar system consists of a transmitter producing electromagnetic waves in the radio or microwaves domain, a transmitting antenna, a receiving antenna (often the same antenna is used for transmitting and receiving) and a receiver and processor to determine properties of the objects. Radio waves (pulsed or continuous) from the transmitter reflect off the objects and return to the receiver, giving information about the objects' locations and speeds. Radar was developed secretly for military use by several countries in the period before and during World War II. A key development was the cavity magnetron in the United Kingdom, which allowed the creation of relatively small systems with sub-meter resolution ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Slant Range
In radio electronics, especially radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, w ... terminology, slant range or slant distance is the distance along the relative direction between two points. If the two points are at the same level (relative to a specific datum), the slant distance equals the horizontal distance. An example of slant range is the distance to an aircraft flying at high altitude with respect to that of the radar antenna. The slant range (1) is the hypotenuse of the triangle represented by the altitude of the aircraft and the distance between the radar antenna and the aircraft's ground track (point (3) on the earth directly below the aircraft). In the absence of altitude information, for example from a height finder, the aircraft location would be plotted ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Length
Length is a measure of distance. In the International System of Quantities, length is a quantity with dimension distance. In most systems of measurement a base unit for length is chosen, from which all other units are derived. In the International System of Units (SI) system the base unit for length is the metre. Length is commonly understood to mean the most extended dimension of a fixed object. However, this is not always the case and may depend on the position the object is in. Various terms for the length of a fixed object are used, and these include height, which is vertical length or vertical extent, and width, breadth or depth. Height is used when there is a base from which vertical measurements can be taken. Width or breadth usually refer to a shorter dimension when length is the longest one. Depth is used for the third dimension of a three dimensional object. Length is the measure of one spatial dimension, whereas area is a measure of two dimensions (length squ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Differential GPS
Differential Global Positioning Systems (DGPSs) supplement and enhance the positional data available from global navigation satellite systems (GNSSs). A DGPS for GPS can increase accuracy by about a thousandfold, from approximately to . DGPSs consist of networks of fixed position, ground-based reference stations. Each reference station calculates the difference between its highly accurate known position and its less accurate satellite-derived position. The stations broadcast this data locally—typically using ground-based transmitters of shorter range. Non-fixed (mobile) receivers use it to correct their position by the same amount, thereby improving their accuracy. The United States Coast Guard (USCG) and the Canadian Coast Guard (CCG) each run DGPSs in the United States and Canada on longwave radio frequencies between and near major waterways and harbors. The USCG's DGPS was named NDGPS (Nationwide DGPS) and was jointly administered by the Coast Guard and the U.S. Departme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wide Area Augmentation System
The Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) is an air navigation aid developed by the Federal Aviation Administration to augment the Global Positioning System (GPS), with the goal of improving its accuracy, integrity, and availability. Essentially, WAAS is intended to enable aircraft to rely on GPS for all phases of flight, including precision approaches to any airport within its coverage area.Federal Aviation Administration (FAAFAQ for WAAS/ref> It may be further enhanced with the Local Area Augmentation System (LAAS) also known by the preferred ICAO term Ground-Based Augmentation System (GBAS) in critical areas. WAAS uses a network of ground-based reference stations, in North America and Hawaii, to measure small variations in the GPS satellites' signals in the western hemisphere. Measurements from the reference stations are routed to master stations, which queue the received Deviation Correction (DC) and send the correction messages to geostationary WAAS satellites in a ti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Laser Rangefinder
A laser rangefinder, also known as a laser telemeter, is a rangefinder that uses a laser beam to determine the distance to an object. The most common form of laser rangefinder operates on the time of flight principle by sending a laser pulse in a narrow beam towards the object and measuring the time taken by the pulse to be reflected off the target and returned to the sender. Due to the high speed of light, this technique is not appropriate for high precision sub-millimeter measurements, where triangulation and other techniques are often used. Pulse The pulse may be coded to reduce the chance that the rangefinder can be jammed. It is possible to use Doppler effect techniques to judge whether the object is moving towards or away from the rangefinder, and if so, how fast. Precision The precision of the instrument is determined by the rise or fall time of the laser pulse and the speed of the receiver. One that uses very sharp laser pulses and has a very fast detector can range ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beam Splitter
A beam splitter or ''beamsplitter'' is an optical device that splits a beam of light into a transmitted and a reflected beam. It is a crucial part of many optical experimental and measurement systems, such as interferometers, also finding widespread application in fibre optic telecommunications. Beam-splitter designs In its most common form, a cube, a beam splitter is made from two triangular glass prisms which are glued together at their base using polyester, epoxy, or urethane-based adhesives. (Before these synthetic resins, natural ones were used, e.g. Canada balsam.) The thickness of the resin layer is adjusted such that (for a certain wavelength) half of the light incident through one "port" (i.e., face of the cube) is reflected and the other half is transmitted due to FTIR (Frustrated Total Internal Reflection). Polarizing beam splitters, such as the Wollaston prism, use birefringent materials to split light into two beams of orthogonal polarization states. Anoth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michelson Interferometer With Corner Cubes
{{disambiguation ...
Michelson may refer to: * Michelson (surname), people with the given name or surname * 27758 Michelson discovered in 1991 * Michelson (crater) on the moon * Michelson-Gale-Pearson experiment, science * Michelson interferometer, most common configuration for optical interferometry * Michelson–Morley experiment, a scientific experiment regarding the luminiferous ether. * Michelson Museum of Art, Texas, USA * Mount Michelson (Brooks Range), Alaska, USA * USNS Michelson T-AGS-23, United States Naval ship * Michelson, the domain-specific language for smart contracts in Tezos * Michelson, Michigan, an unincorporated community See also * Mickelson * Michaelson Michaelson is an English patronymic surname meaning "son of Michael". There are varied English and Scandinavian spellings. It is rare as a given name. Notable people with the surname include: * Ben Michaelson (born 1981), American swimmer * Ingr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
