Influence of flight time on aero-optical imaging quality degradation of the conformal dome

When the missile is flying at high speed, the surface shape and refractive index of the conformal dome will change due to the aero-optic effect, which results in different image quality at different flight times. Hence, it is of great significance to study the influence of flight time on aero-optical imaging quality degradation of the conformal dome. Taking an airto- air missile as an example, this paper uses Zernike polynomials, image simulation, and peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) to evaluate the degeneration of the aero-optical imaging quality of an ellipsoid dome with a flight time range of 0-10 s under varying conditions. The simulation results show that, with the increase of flight time, (1) the dynamic range of tilt, defocus, astigmatism, and coma increase; (2) the PSNRs of the simulated images decrease. Therefore, the effect of flight time on the aero-optic imaging quality degradation of the ellipsoidal dome is gradually serious.