Cooperative detection applied to THz imaging cameras

Abstract

THz technology for developing imaging systems has recently aroused great interest, mainly due to the large number of applications in which these frequencies can be used: security, vision in hard environments, etc. The technological difficulties involved in producing a large number of detectors at these frequencies, proves to be a serious constrain that limits the possibilities of the whole system. It is frequently necessary for the camera to include some kind of moving mirrors in order to scan the entire vision field. We propose a method that significantly reduces the number of detectors needed for achieving a certain resolution by means of diffraction that paradoxically is the resolution limiting factor in current imaging devices. The method uses diffraction as a way of achieving spatial diversity and as an anti-aliasing LPF. Decimation is used to reduce the number of detectors.