Patent ID: 7345743

Claim:
A method for determining at least range to a target comprising: sending a laser beam signal to said target, obtaining a replica of a sent said laser beam signal including a temporal index indicating time of transmission of said laser beam signal, developing a predetermined number of copies of said replica of said laser beam signal, applying a different, predetermined time delay to each copy of said predetermined number of copies, each said time delay corresponding to a discrete different range to a said target, receiving a return reflection of said laser beam signal from said target, said return reflection being delayed with respect to said temporal index by travel time to and from said target, comparing a received said return reflection of said laser beam signal to each of delayed said predetermined number of copies in order to find a said copy having a highest correlation with said received return reflection, using said predetermined time delay associated with a found said copy having a highest correlation with said received return reflection to calculate range to said target.