Holography breakthrough boosts accuracy of China’s artillery

Source
Global Times
Editor
Huang Panyue
Time
2018-08-03 09:15:21

Researchers at a university in North China's Tianjin Municipality made a breakthrough in holography based on optical metasurfaces, with an expert saying the technology could improve the accuracy of military reconnaissance.

A research team from the Center for Terahertz Waves of Tianjin University has greatly advanced holographic imaging technology and realized reflective chiral holography for the first time, Science and Technology Daily reported on Wednesday.

"Using the metasurfaces material and terahertz waves, the updated holographic plate could exhibit an image with essential features and very accurate status of location, which would greatly improve military reconnaissance," Song Zhongping, a military expert, told the Global Times on Thursday.

Holographic plates with metasurfaces could also record more data and better reproduce the images than ordinary plates, Song added.

A terahertz wave is a kind of electromagnetic wave, which has strong penetrability with good directionality. The waves are safe for humans. They are currently the least understood and least developed electromagnetic spectral band, according to the report.

The metasurfaces plate can recognize different polarization states of light. This enables it to store more information and make fully independent holographic imaging, the newspaper reported.

"Such holography technology must pass various engineering tests under a battlefield environment to confirm its functioning before it is eventually adopted by the People's Liberation Army (PLA)," Song noted.

If fully developed, the technology would bring a sharp advance for artillery units of the PLA, allowing the units to achieve global leadership in artillery technology, Song said.

The ability to convert a good idea into combat capability as soon as possible is important to the PLA, as it also would allow units to have a quick reaction in future battles, Song added.

 

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