STATISTICAL MEASUREMENTS OF IRRADIANCE FLUCTUATIONS PRODUCED BY A REFLECTIVE MEMBRANE OPTICAL SCINTILLATOR

Atmospheric scintillation of a He:Ne laser beam was physically simulat ed in the laboratory using a Reflective Membrane Optical Scintillator (RMOS). The RMOS was characterized and tested under varying operating conditions and the statistical validity of the simulated intensity flu ctuations was tested by fitting the probability density functions (PDF s) obtained to the lognormal, gamma, Rice-Nakagami, K and I-K distribu tions, It was confirmed that scintillation could be simulated over a r ange of turbulence levels using the RMS driving amplitude as a simple control variable. The RMOS was found to be a useful approach to the la boratory simulation of atmospheric scintillation. Copyright (C) 1995 E lsevier Science Ltd.