An Antitank Missile Seeker Employing An Infrared Schottky Barrier Focal Plane Array

The work reported herein resulted from a subcontract with the McDonnell-Douglas Astro-nautics Company, whose prime contract was sponsored by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency under ARPA Order No. 3974 and monitored by U.S. Army Missile Command under Contract No. DAAH01-80-C-0799. Infrared focal plane array technology has advanced rapidly in the past two years. This technology promises to offer advantages for FLIR systems as well as advanced missile seeker concepts. RCA is in the forefront of this technology and has incorporated its focal plane array into a missile seeker which is described in this presentation. The presentation is divided into the four parts as shown in Figure 1. In the first part, the RCA Schottky Barrier infrared focal plane array is briefly described. Since it has been thoroughly described in the literature, only summary information is provided. However, a list of references is provided so that those interested can obtain more information on the technology. The second part describes the details of the seeker along with the reasons certain design approaches were selected. The third part provides a summary of the key seeker performance parameters as they relate to the requirements selected for the program. The fourth part summarizes results of the entire effort.