Patent ID: 11867618
Assignee: HERIOT-WATT UNIVERSITY
Field: Measurement (Instruments)
Classification: CPC G | IPC G

Claim 20:
21. A method for quantitative measurements of concentrations of chemical targets in an open-path measuring arrangement, the method comprising:
generating broadband IR light,
generating calibration light,
synchronously receiving and then modulating, by means of a scanning interferometer, the generated broadband IR light and the generated calibration light,
providing a launch system for illuminating the chemical targets with the modulated broadband IR light and a collector system for receiving the modulated broadband IR light spectrally-modulated by the chemical targets such that an optical axis of a launching path of the launch system is substantially co-aligned with an optical axis of the collector system,
providing a detector system for detecting and then recording spectra of interference fringes generated by the spectrally-modulated broadband IR light and by the modulated calibration light,
providing a computer processor,
providing a non-transitory computer readable medium encoded with a computer program,
wherein the computer program comprises instructions stored therein for causing a computer processor to perform a plurality of functions to simultaneously compute concentrations of each of the chemical targets from spectra of the recorded interference fringes generated by the spectrally-modulated broadband IR light and by the modulated calibration light; and
extracting an effective illumination spectrum of infrared light illuminating the chemical targets and using the effective illumination spectrum to simultaneously compute the concentrations of each of the chemical targets.