Jorg Onno Entzinger

Development and evaluation of a new airspeed information system utilizing airborne Doppler LIDAR

We have developed a prototype of a new air speed information system leveraging the technological advance of a practical airborne Doppler Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR). The proposed system uses the LIDAR to sense wind speeds up to several tens of seconds ahead of an aircraft in real time, and uses the data to provide predictive airspeed information called L-PSPD (LIDAR-based predicted airspeed indicator) and a target approach speed called a L-TSPD (LIDAR-based target airspeed indicator) to the pilot via a newly designed cockpit display and/or directly to the autothrottle system. A series of piloted evaluations was carried out by flight simulator and flight test to verify the effectiveness of the system. The results indicate that the proposed system improved airspeed control performance and reduced workload during approaches under windshear and turbulent conditions. We obtained the advantages and disadvantages of each proposed display from subjective evaluation data and objective workload data from visual secondary task performance, electroencephalogram (EEG), electrocardiogram (ECG) and eye recorder.

Improving coaxial measurements in laser welding by correcting distortions of a laser focus lens with a wide field of view

A compact, lightweight, and multifunctional head for robotic laser welding applications has been equipped with a camera to provide a real time image stream of the work piece for seam teaching, tracking, and inspection purposes [D. Iakovou, R. G. K. M. Aarts, and J. Meijer, “Integrated sensors for robotic laser welding,” in Proceedings of the Third International WLT Conference on Lasers in Manufacturing, Munich, Germany (AT-Fachverlag GmBH, Stuttgart, 2005), pp. 121–126; D. Iakovou, R. G. K. M. Aarts, and J. Meijer “Sensor integration for robotic laser welding processes,” (paper No. 2301), in Proceedings of the International Congress on Applications of Lasers and Electro-Optics (ICALEO), Miami, 2005 (unpublished)]. The camera uses part of the laser focusing optics. Research has been done to identify and correct for positioning errors introduced by the optical system. A robust camera and lens calibration method has been developed. Calibration and seam detection experiments have been performed and the results were used for seam tracking