Airborne ultraviolet imaging system for oil slick surveillance: oil-seawater contrast, imaging concept, signal-to-noise ratio, optical design, and optomechanical model.

The airborne ultraviolet imaging system, which assesses oil slick areas better than visible and infrared optical systems, was designed to monitor and track oil slicks in coastal regions. A model was built to achieve the upwelling radiance distribution of oil-covered sea and clean seawater, based on the radiance transfer software. With this model, the oil-seawater contrast, which affects the detection of oil-covered coastal areas, was obtained. The oil-seawater contrast, fundamental imaging concept, analog calculation of SNR, optical design, and optomechanical configuration of the airborne ultraviolet imaging system are illustrated in this paper. The study of an airborne ultraviolet imaging system with F-number 3.4 and a 40° field of view (FOV) in near ultraviolet channel (0.32-0.38 μm) was illustrated and better imaging quality was achieved. The ground sample distance (GSD) is from 0.35 to 0.7 m with flight height ranges from 0.5 to 1 km. Comparisons of detailed characteristics of the airborne ultraviolet imaging system with the corresponding characteristics of previous ultraviolet systems were tabulated, and these comparisons showed that this system can achieve a wide FOV and a relative high SNR. A virtual mechanical prototype and tolerances analysis are illustrated in this paper to verify the performance of fabrication and assembly of the ultraviolet system.