Loza Y. Improvement of aerocosmic environmental monitoring system by using spectropolarimeters

Research subject: system of aerocosmic ecological monitoring of atmospheric ozone and aerosol. Research objective: creation of a universal scientific and methodological apparatus for aberrations and polarization calculation of diffraction spectropolarimeters, that can be used in aerocosmic monitoring systems. Research methods: ray-tracing, diffraction theory, numerical modeling, Kramers-Kronig method, Stokes theory. Measuring 4 Stokes parameters provides for obtaining fundamentally new ecological information: refraction and absorption indexes (i.e. chemical compound), maximum and dispersion of size function, anisotropy, optical thickness and vertical distribution of atmospheric aerosol. Moreover it enables to improve the accuracy of total ozone content and vertical ozone distribution measurements. Therefore it allows increasing the quality of ecological and climate models by including real-time high-accurate monitoring data. A new aberration-and-polarization calculation method for concave diffraction gratings is proposed which has higher accuracy comparing to classic approaches, capable of analyzing and optimizing schema of spectropolarimeters with non-classic optical elements (aspherical surfaces, variable grating step, adaptive optics elements, etc.) by introduction and minimization of aberration functionals. The method also provides for monochromator instrumental polarization influence calculation and determination of its influence on ecological data accuracy. New optical schema of monochromator, static polarimetric block, passive and active instrumental polarization correction systems of small-size spectropolarimeters are proposed. To insure the quality of ecological data measurement an advanced Kramers-Kronig method for spectropolarimeter optical elements degradation process modeling and aerosol chemical compound determination is presented. The the research results were introduced in Research and Production Association Arsenal corp. and in State Ecological Academy of Post-Graduate Education and Management. The proposed scientific and practical results may be used to create spectropolarimeters for aerocosmic Earth atmosphere monitoring systems. The results may also be used for training of specialists in environmental monitoring using aerocosmic technologies.