COHERENT DOPPLER LIDAR MEASUREMENTS OF WINDS IN THE WEAK SIGNAL REGIME

In the weak signal regime coherent Doppler lidar velocity estimates ar e characterized by a localized distribution around the true mean veloc ity and a uniform distribution of random outliers over the velocity se arch space. The performance of velocity estimators is defined by the s tandard deviation of the good estimates around the true mean velocity and the fraction of random outliers. The quality of velocity estimates is improved with pulse accumulation. The performance of velocity esti mates from two different coherent Doppler lidars in the weak signal re gime is compared with the predictions of computer simulations for puls e accumulation from 1 to 100 pulses. (C) 1997 Optical Society of Ameri ca.