This PDF file contains the front matter associated with SPIE Proceedings Volume 10328, including the Title Page, Copyright information, Table of Contents, Introduction (if any), and Conference Committee listing.

Ultra-high speed (UHS) CMOS image sensors with on-chop analog memories placed on the periphery of pixel array for the visualization of UHS phenomena are overviewed in this paper. The developed UHS CMOS image sensors consist of 400^H×256^V pixels and 128 memories/pixel, and the readout speed of 1Tpixel/sec is obtained, leading to 10 Mfps full resolution video capturing with consecutive 128 frames, and 20 Mfps half resolution video capturing with consecutive 256 frames. The first development model has been employed in the high speed video camera and put in practical use in 2012. By the development of dedicated process technologies, photosensitivity improvement and power consumption reduction were simultaneously achieved, and the performance improved version has been utilized in the commercialized high-speed video camera since 2015 that offers 10 Mfps with ISO16,000 photosensitivity. Due to the improved photosensitivity, clear images can be captured and analyzed even under low light condition, such as under a microscope as well as capturing of UHS light emission phenomena.

This paper presents a 20 Mfps 32 × 84 pixels CMOS burst-mode imager featuring high frame depth with a passive in-pixel amplifier. Compared to the CCD alternatives, CMOS burst-mode imagers are attractive for their low power consumption and integration of circuitry such as ADCs. Due to storage capacitor size and its noise limitations, CMOS burst-mode imagers usually suffer from a lower frame depth than CCD implementations. In order to capture fast transitions over a longer time span, an in-pixel CDS technique has been adopted to reduce the required memory cells for each frame by half. Moreover, integrated with in-pixel CDS, an in-pixel NMOS-only passive amplifier alleviates the kTC noise requirements of the memory bank allowing the usage of smaller capacitors. Specifically, a dense 108-cell MOS memory bank (10fF/cell) has been implemented inside a 30μm pitch pixel, with an area of 25 × 30μm² occupied by the memory bank. There is an improvement of about 4x in terms of frame depth per pixel area by applying in-pixel CDS and amplification. With the amplifier’s gain of 3.3, an FD input-referred RMS noise of 1mV is achieved at 20 Mfps operation. While the amplification is done without burning DC current, including the pixel source follower biasing, the full pixel consumes 10μA at 3.3V supply voltage at full speed. The chip has been fabricated in imec’s 130nm CMOS CIS technology.

We have developed a 3D stacked 16M-pixel, 3.8-μm pixel pitch, global-shutter CMOS image sensor with pixel level interconnections using four million micro bumps. The four photodiodes in the unit pixel circuit on the top substrate share one micro-bump interconnection at a 7.6-μm pitch. Each signal of the photodiodes is transferred to the corresponding storage node on the bottom substrate via the micro bump. This 3D architecture gives the image sensor not only a 16M-pixel global-shutter function but also a 2M-pixel 10K-fps high-speed image capturing mode with a burst of eight images. In this paper, we report on the improvement in the high-speed image capturing mode to operate at up to 100K fps by optimizing the timing for the higher-speed |image capturing with 2M-pixel resolution. In addition, we estimated the further potential of the 3D image sensor for high-speed image capturing to make the most of the 3D structure, which comprised one photodiode in the pixel unit circuit on the top substrate and electrically connected multiple storage nodes on the bottom substrate. This enables the image sensor to capture a burst of as many frames as the number of storage nodes in the pixel unit without sacrificing a photodiode and have better sensitivity with photodiodes fully occupying the chip surface with bigger photodiodes than when using conventional sensors. These results demonstrate that our 3D stacking technology pushes the envelope of capturing high-speed images with monolithic sensors.

AGIPD is a hybrid pixel detector developed by DESY, PSI, and the Universities of Bonn and Hamburg. It is targeted for use at the European XFEL, a source with unique properties: a train of up to 2700 pulses is repeated at 10 Hz rate. The pulses inside a train are ≤100fs long and separated by 220 ns, containing up to 10¹² photons of 12.4 keV each. The readout ASICs with 64 x 64 pixels each have to cope with these properties: Single photon sensitivity and a dynamic range up to ⪆10⁴ photons/pixel in the same image as well as storage for as many as possible images of a pulse train for delayed readout, prior to the next train. The high impinging photon flux also requires a very radiation hard design of sensor and ASIC, which uses 130 nm CMOS technology and radiation tolerant techniques. The signal path inside a pixel of the ASIC consists of a charge sensitive preamplifier with 3 individual gains, adaptively selected by a subsequent discriminator. The preamp also feeds to a correlated double sampling stage, which writes to an analogue memory to record 352 frames. It is random-access, so it can be used most efficiently by overwriting bad or empty images. Encoded gain information is stored to a similar memory. Readout of these memories is via a common charge sensitive amplifier in each pixel, and multiplexers on four differential ports. Operation of the ASIC is controlled via a command interface, using 3 LVDS lines. It also serves to configure the chip’s operational parameters and timings.

This paper presents a CMOS Time-of-Flight (TOF) range imager using pinned-photodiode based high-speed 4-tap lock-in pixels with lateral-electric-field charge modulators (LEFM) in a 0.11 um CIS process. The proposed lock-in pixel structure using lateral electric field control is suitable for implementing a multiple-tap charge modulator while achieving high-speed charge transfer for high time resolution. The TOF imager with the multiple-tap charge modulators is expected to have background light cancelling capability in one frame and to improve range resolution with the 4 time windows for a range-shifted light pulse. Measurement results of the implemented TOF imager with 160×240 pixels are reported.

In this paper, a 3D 1Gfps BSI image sensor is proposed, where 128 × 256 pixels are located in the top-tier chip and a 32 × 32 localized driver array in the bottom-tier chip. Pixels are designed with Multiple Collection Gates (MCG), which collects photons selectively with different collection gates being active at intervals of 1ns to achieve 1Gfps. For the drivers, a global PLL is designed, which consists of a ring oscillator with 6-stage current starved differential inverters, achieving a wide frequency tuning range from 40MHz to 360MHz (20ps rms jitter). The drivers are the replicas of the ring oscillator that operates within a PLL. Together with level shifters and XNOR gates, continuous 3.3V pulses are generated with desired pulse width, which is 1/12 of the PLL clock period. The driver array is activated by a START signal, which propagates through a highly balanced clock tree, to activate all the pixels at the same time with virtually negligible skew.

Crosstalk in the backside-illuminated multi-collection-gate (BSI-MCG) image sensor was analyzed by means of Monte Carlo simulation. The BSI-MCG image sensor was proposed to achieve the temporal resolution of 1 ns. In this sensor, signal electrons generated by incident light near the back side travel to the central area of the pixel on the front side. Most of the signal electrons are collected by a collecting gate, to which a higher voltage is applied than that of other collection gates. However, due to spatial and temporal diffusion, some of the signal electrons migrate to other collection gates than the collecting gate, resulting in spatiotemporal crosstalk, i.e., mixture of signal electrons at neighboring collection gates and/or pixels. To reduce the crosstalk, the BSI-MCG structure is modified and the performance is preliminarily evaluated by Monte Carlo simulation. An additional donut-shaped N type implantation at the collection-gate area improves the potential gradient to the collecting gate, which reduces the crosstalk caused by the spatial diffusion. A multi-framing camera based on the BSI-MCG image sensor can be applied to Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging Microscopy (FLIM). In this case, crosstalk reduces accuracy in estimation of the lifetimes of fluorophore samples. The inaccuracy is compensated in a post image processing based on a proposed impulse response method.

Image based metrology such as Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) depends on the comparison of two images of an object taken in fast succession. Cameras for these applications provide the so-called ‘double shutter’ mode: One frame is captured with a short exposure time and in direct succession a second frame with a long exposure time can be recorded. The difference in the exposure times is typically no problem since illumination is provided by a pulsed light source such as a laser and the measurements are performed in a darkened environment to prevent ambient light from accumulating in the long second exposure time. However, measurements of self-luminous processes (e.g. plasma, combustion ...) as well as experiments in ambient light are difficult to perform and require special equipment (external shutters, highspeed image sensors, multi-sensor systems ...). Unfortunately, all these methods incorporate different drawbacks such as reduced resolution, degraded image quality, decreased light sensitivity or increased susceptibility to decalibration. In the solution presented here, off-the-shelf CCD sensors are used with a special timing to combine neighbouring pixels in a binning-like way. As a result, two frames of short exposure time can be captured in fast succession. They are stored in the on-chip vertical register in a line-interleaved pattern, read out in the common way and separated again by software. The two resultant frames are completely congruent; they expose no insensitive lines or line shifts and thus enable sub-pixel accurate measurements. A third frame can be captured at the full resolution analogue to the double shutter technique. Image based measurement techniques such as PIV can benefit from this mode when applied in bright environments. The third frame is useful e.g. for acceleration measurements or for particle tracking applications.

Several recent studies in compressive video sensing have realized scene capture beyond the fundamental trade-off limit between spatial resolution and temporal resolution using random space-time sampling. However, most of these studies showed results for higher frame rate video that were produced by simulation experiments or using an optically simulated random sampling camera, because there are currently no commercially available image sensors with random exposure or sampling capabilities. We fabricated a prototype complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor with quasi pixel-wise exposure timing that can realize nonuniform space-time sampling. The prototype sensor can reset exposures independently by columns and fix these amount of exposure by rows for each 8x8 pixel block. This CMOS sensor is not fully controllable via the pixels, and has line-dependent controls, but it offers flexibility when compared with regular CMOS or charge-coupled device sensors with global or rolling shutters. We propose a method to realize pseudo-random sampling for high-speed video acquisition that uses the flexibility of the CMOS sensor. We reconstruct the high-speed video sequence from the images produced by pseudo-random sampling using an over-complete dictionary.

The advent of coherent high-harmonic pulses in the extreme-ultraviolet (XUV) wavelength region generated from an intense femtosecond near-infrared pulse has made it possible to observe the ultrafast dynamics of matter with a time scale of less than 1 femtosecond, which is conventionally called the 'attosecond' time scale. The mainstream of this kind of study is based on pump-probe measurement, in which an XUV attosecond pump/probe pulse should always be accompanied by an intense near-infrared probe/pump laser pulse because the intensity of an XUV attosecond pulse is usually too low to be utilized for attosecond-pump and attosecond-probe measurements. In contrast, we have aimed at generating an intense attosecond pulse to realize such measurements, and we have developed an XUV harmonic beam line with a pulse energy of more than 1 μJ, which is sufficient for interacting with matter in both pump and probe pulses, even though the temporal profile exhibits a train of attosecond pulses in a few-fs train envelope. In this presentation, we introduce our studies on the attosecond electronic dynamics and 10-fs nuclear dynamics in diatomic molecules, which cannot be observed without using our XUV harmonic beam line.

We propose and experimentally demonstrate a new all optical-framing photography that uses hyperspectral imaging methods to record a chirped pulse’s temporal-spatial information. This proposed method consists of three parts: (1) a chirped laser pulse encodes temporal phenomena onto wavelengths; (2) a lenslet array generates a series of integral pupil images;(3) a dispersive device disperses the integral images at void space of image sensor. Compared with Ultrafast All-Optical Framing Technology(Daniel Frayer,2013,2014) and Sequentially Time All-Optical Mapping Photography( Nakagawa 2014, 2015), our method is convenient to adjust the temporal resolution and to flexibly increase the numbers of frames. Theoretically, the temporal resolution of our scheme is limited by the amount of dispersion that is added to a Fourier transform limited femtosecond laser pulse. Correspondingly, the optimal number of frames is decided by the ratio of the observational time window to the temporal resolution, and the effective pixels of each frame are mostly limited by the dimensions M×N of the lenslet array. For example, if a 40fs Fourier transform limited femtosecond pulse is stretched to ~10ps, a CCD camera with 2048×3072 pixels can record ~15 framing images with temporal resolution of 650fs and image size of 100×100 pixels. As spectrometer structure, our recording part has another advantage that not only amplitude images but also frequency domain interferograms can be imaged. Therefore, it is comparatively easy to capture fast dynamics in the refractive index change of materials. A further dynamic experiment is being conducted.

An ultra-flat and ultra-broadband supercontinuum (SC) is demonstrated in a 4-m photonic crystal fiber (PCF) pumped by an Yb-doped all-fiber noise-like pulses (NLP) laser. The Yb-doped fiber laser is seeded by a SESAM mode-locked fiber laser, and amplified by cascaded fiber amplifiers, with its center wavelength, repetition frequency and the average noise-like bunch duration of 1064.52 nm, 50.18 MHz, 9.14 ps, respectively. Pumped by this NLP laser, the SC source has a 3 dB bandwidth and a 7 dB bandwidth (ignore the pump residue) of 1440 nm and 1790 nm at the maximum average output power of 6.94 W. To the best of our knowledge, this flatness is significantly prominent for the performance of PCF-based SC sources.

A high power diode-pumped continuous-wave Tm:YAP laser with a piece of silicon chip as the output coupler (Si-OC) is demonstrated. A maximum output power of 13 W with a beam quality of M² ≤ 1.45 at 1931 nm was obtained, corresponding to an optical-to-optical efficiency of 31%, and a slope efficiency of 33%. To our best knowledge, this is the first report of utilizing silicon as a output coupler on solid Tm:YAP laser system. The mechanism of silicon output coupler on Tm:YAP laser is also discussed in this letter. Because of the intriguing characteristics of silicon, such as high damage threshold, low cost and long-pass filter property, double-sided polishing single crystal silicon chip can perform as a good output coupler in high power laser system near 2 μm region.

Xenon arc lamps have been identified as a suitable continuous light source for high-speed imaging, specifically high-speed Schlieren and shadowgraphy. One issue when setting us such systems is the time that it takes to reduce a finite source to the approximation of a point source for z-type schlieren. A preliminary design of a compact compound lens for use with a commercial Xenon arc lamp was tested for suitability. While it was found that there is some dimming of the illumination at the spot periphery, the overall spectral and luminance distribution of the compact source is quite acceptable, especially considering the time benefit that it represents.

The setup under development is intended to serve as the Russian National Primary Special Standard for Laser Pulse Duration in the range from 10 to 1000 ps. The core components of the standard are a streak camera with picosecond temporal resolution and a Fabry-Pérot etalon illuminated by femtosecond laser pulses. The etalon defines a time interval which is used to calibrate the temporal scale of the streak camera. The standard includes a picosecond laser pulse generator for reproduction and transfer of the unit of laser pulse duration to another measuring instrument or secondary standard. Described are the principles of operation, the construction of the standard, and the results of preliminary experiments to determine its metrological properties.

As an ultrafast 3D imaging technique, an improved light-in-flight recording by holography using a femtosecond is presented. To record 3D image of light propagation, a voluminous light-scattering medium is introduced to the light-inflight recording by holography. A mode-locked Ti:Sapphire laser are employed for the optical source. To generate the 3D image of propagating light, a voluminous light-scattering medium is made of gelatin jelly and set in the optical path of the object wave of holography. 3D motion picture of propagation of a femtosecond light pulse was achieved for 260ps with 220fs temporal resolution. Digital recording of 3D image of light propagation is also presented. To record the 3D image of the light propagation, digital holography is combined with the light-in-flight recording by holography using a voluminous light-scattering medium. The hologram is recorded with an image sensor such as CCD image sensor. The image of the light is reconstructed from the digitally recorded hologram by computer. To obtain the motion picture of the 3D image of the light propagation, a set of pieces of holograms consisting of 512 × 512 pixels are extracted from the whole area of the digitally recorded hologram. The position of the extracted piece on the recoded hologram is shifted along the direction in which the reference optical pulse swept on the image sensor, piece-by-piece of the hologram. The set of the pieces are reconstructed sequentially, then the 3D digital motion picture of propagation of femtosecond light pulse is achieved. The recordable time of the motion picture was 60 ps.

Imaging of sound aids the understanding of the acoustical phenomena such as propagation, reflection, and diffraction, which is strongly required for various acoustical applications. The imaging of sound is commonly done by using a microphone array, whereas optical methods have recently been interested due to its contactless nature. The optical measurement of sound utilizes the phase modulation of light caused by sound. Since light propagated through a sound field changes its phase as proportional to the sound pressure, optical phase measurement technique can be used for the sound measurement. Several methods including laser Doppler vibrometry and Schlieren method have been proposed for that purpose. However, the sensitivities of the methods become lower as a frequency of sound decreases. In contrast, since the sensitivities of the phase-shifting technique do not depend on the frequencies of sounds, that technique is suitable for the imaging of sounds in the low-frequency range. The principle of imaging of sound using parallel phase-shifting interferometry was reported by the authors (K. Ishikawa et al., Optics Express, 2016). The measurement system consists of a high-speed polarization camera made by Photron Ltd., and a polarization interferometer. This paper reviews the principle briefly and demonstrates the high-speed imaging of acoustical phenomena. The results suggest that the proposed system can be applied to various industrial problems in acoustical engineering.

This paper proposed the detection method for the depth position of a dot to calibrate along the depth direction of two cameras, which is performed with obtaining the reconstruction distances to match the reconstructed volumes at each camera. We determined the reconstruction distance of each camera by using the dot-array plate and the proposed detection method of a dot. The reconstruction distance is calculated as the position that the variance of the real and the imaginary part of dots becomes a minimum value. We investigate the effect of dot spacing in the dot-array plate by comparing the error between the calculated distance and the true distance in numerical simulation. In addition, the effect of this method is also experimentally confirmed.

Parallel phase-shifting digital holography is one of digital holographic techniques and good at high-speed recording of moving object. The phase distribution of the object can be calculated from recorded hologram so that the technique has been actively applied in high-speed three-dimensional measurement. In this paper, we review a high-speed parallel phase-shifting digital holography system consists of a high-speed polarization-imaging camera (FASTCAM-SA5-P, Photoron, Inc.) and a Nd:YVO₄ laser with 532 nm wavelength, 150 mW output power. In the experiment, a simple electrical discharging equipment was set for the fast object, and the electrical discharging phenomenon was successfully recorded at the rate of 25,000 fps, and 1,000,000 fps respectively.

X-ray imaging is very useful to investigate a imploded core plasma in inertial fusion experiment. We can obtain many information from X-ray images, such as shape, density and temperature of a plasma. X-ray framing camera (XFC) is capable of taking two dimensional time resolved X-ray images. In previous work, we developed a numerical model of XFC to analyze its X-ray image. Calculated results agreed qualitatively with experimental results. However, it is not enough when we discuss absolute value of the signal. Moreover, in high energy laser experiment, high photon flux may cause signal depletion of XFC. This is a problem for accurate X-ray measurement. In this paper, we report our improved calculation model including signal depletion. Results using the new model shows signal depletion at high applied voltage range. The new model are evaluated by tabletop laser experiments. Calculated results using the new model agree quantitatively with experimental results.

X-ray grazing incidence optics are widely used in X-ray astronomy, especially for imaging payloads Wolter optics are the most workhorse. However, as there are two cascaded mirrors in Wolter type, the efficiency is quite low after two reflections. In this paper a kind of nested conical concentrator is developed with only one reflection to concentrate the X-ray photons and obtain the timing information. The mirror length is 200mm, the mirror foils cover from 38.8 to 100mm in diameter. D263T glass of 0.3mm thickness is used as mirror substrate with Iridium film deposited in order to improve the X-ray reflection. The D263T glass is slumped at 580°C with precisely machined and polished mold. 3D printed resin serves as upper mold for glass cutting. The quality of mirror substrate is mainly determined by the surface of forming mandrel. As the surface roughness is quite important for X-ray reflection, after deposition it is tested with interferometer and AFM, and the roughness is 0.6nm. Mirror integration based on visible light is built, and the conical mirrors are assembled and adjusted by real time monitoring for the focal point of visible light. With the monochromic X-ray source, the concentrator efficiency is tested as 38%@1.49keV, 20%@4.51keV. The focal point is Φ8.2mm in Xray, with 80% of its energy encircled in a 4mm width. This kind of X-ray concentrator could be used in X-ray navigation, X-ray communication and other X-ray timing astronomy.

Temporal parameters of synchrotron pulse radiation at damping ring (DP) installation of VEPP-5 type were measured with the help of PS-1/S1 picosecond streak camera having 1.5 ps time resolution. These measurements were proceeded within 400-900 nm spectral range. It has been shown that our streak camera may record either a train of electron bunches with ns-duration or internal structure inside a single bunch. We were able to record the distance ~ 1.5 ns between separate bunches as well as their amplitude, which depends on particle numbers inside a bunch. Depending on linear accelerator mode of operation it was possible to define a single bunch duration, which was deviated within the range of 20-100 ps. The temporal structure of a single bunch was measured with 1.5 ps time accuracy. As a result, the VEPP-5 damping ring parameters were optimized, and particles injection conditions were improved. In addition, we have measured the temporal parameters of Vavilov-Cherenkov radiation (VCR) emitted by electron beam of linear accelerator. Our results provided important information on electron bunches formation and their quality inside linear accelerator before electrons injection inside a damping ring. Another series of experiments were done at VEPP-4M electron-positron collider. The dependence of beam length of the beam current measured with streak-camera allowed us to compute the wide-band impedance of the accelerator. The same data were obtained at Siberia-2 synchrotron radiation source (NRC “Kurchatov Institute”, Moscow).

Streak tube imaging lidar, as a novel flash lidar, due to its advantages of higher resolution for low contrast conditions, compact and rugged physical configurations, small image distortions owing to its scannerless design, and higher image update rates, has immense potential to provide 3D single-laser-pulse scannerless imaging, 3D multispectral imaging, 3D multispectral fluorescence imaging, and 3D polarimetry. In order to further reduce the size and enlarge the field of view (FOV) of the lidar system, we designed a super small-size, large photocathode area and meshless streak tube with spherical cathode and screen. With the aid of Computer Simulation Technology Software package (CST), a model of the streak tube was built, and its predominant performances were illustrated via tracking electron trajectories. Spatial resolution of the streak tube reaches 20lp/mm over the entire ∅28mm photocathode working area, and its temporal resolution is better than 30ps. Most importantly, the external dimensions of the streak tube are only ∅50mmx100mm. And several prototypes are already manufactured on the basis of the computer design.

A dissector is an electron-optical device designed for measurement of periodic light pulses of subnanosecond and picosecond duration. LI-602 dissector developed at Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics (BINP SB RAS) is widely used for routine measurements of a longitudinal profile of electron and positron beams at BINP electron-positron colliders and other similar installations^(1,2). LI-602 dissector is a part of many optical diagnostic systems and provides temporal resolution of about 20 ps. Recently a new generation of picosecond dissectors were created on the basis of the PIF- 01/S1 picosecond streak-image tube designed and manufactured at the A.M.Prokhorov General Physics Institute (GPI) Photoelectronics Department^(3,4). The results of the measurements of instrument function of the new dissector based on PIF-01/S1, which were carried out in the static mode⁽⁵⁾ showed that temporal resolution of the dissector can be better than 3-4 ps (FWHM). The results of temporal resolution calibration of the new-generation picosecond dissector carried out at the specialized set-up based on a femtosecond Ti:sapphire laser and recent results of longitudinal beam profile measurements at BINP damping ring are given in this work.

The fusion diagnostic community require optical recording instruments with precise time resolution covering a dynamic range of many orders of magnitude. In 2012 the Laboratory for Laser Energetics, Photek and Sydor Instruments embarked on the re-design of an improved streak tube for fusion diagnostics. As a baseline, we started with the Photek STY streak tube because the tube body can accommodate a 35 mm long photocathode. Electron optical modelling was carried out by both Paul Jaanimagi in the US and by Photek in a parallel exercise. Many changes and modifications were made: the time resolution was improved to 5 ps, the usable cathode length was increased from 20mm to 32 mm under high extraction field operation and the off-axis spatial resolution was substantially improved compared to other tubes of this format. Several tubes have been built and tested in a Sydor ROSS-5800 streak cameras, and show greatly improved resolution (MTF).

Image sampling is a simple, convenient and working scheme to obtain two-dimensional (2D) images on high-speed streak cameras which have only one-dimensional (1D) slit cathode as an imaging sensor on a streak tube. 1D sampling of a 2D image in one direction was realized as Multi-Imaging X-ray Streak camera (MIXS) with a similar configuration to TV raster scan. 2D sampling of a 2D image was realized as 2-D Sampling Image X-ray Streak camera (2D-SIXS) with a similar configuration to CCD pixels. For optical-UV streak cameras, 2D fiber plate coupled to the output of a streak camera was untied and fibers were rearranged to form a line on the cathode slit. In these schemes, clever arrangement of the sampling lines or points relative to the streaking direction were essential for avoiding overlap of the streaked signals with each other. These streak cameras with image sampling technique were successfully applied to laser plasma experiment, particularly for laser-driven nuclear fusion research with simultaneous temporal- and spatial resolutions of 10 ps and 15 μm, respectively. This paper reviews the concept, history, and such applications of the scheme.

Laser driven inertial confinement fusion (ICF) plasmas typically have burn durations on the order of 100 ps. Time resolved imaging of the x-ray self emission during the hot spot formation is an important diagnostic tool which gives information on implosion symmetry, transient features and stagnation time. Traditional x-ray gated imagers for ICF use microchannel plate detectors to obtain gate widths of 40-100 ps. The development of electron pulse-dilation imaging has enabled a 10X improvement in temporal resolution over legacy instruments. In this technique, the incoming x-ray image is converted to electrons at a photocathode. The electrons are accelerated with a time-varying potential that leads to temporal expansion as the electron signal transits the tube. This expanded signal is recorded with a gated detector and the effective temporal resolution of the composite system can be as low as several picoseconds. An instrument based on this principle, known as the Dilation X-ray Imager (DIXI) has been constructed and fielded at the National Ignition Facility. Design features and experimental results from DIXI will be presented.

Fast neutrons, which are neutrons with energies greater than 1 MeV, are expected to be a source of nondestructive inspection for a large-size infrastructure such as a bridge girder because of their mean free path exceeding the meter. A neutron-imaging device with 10-ns time resolution can discriminate pulsed neutrons from X-rays via time of flight. For this purpose, we require a fast-response neutron imager with large aperture and high image resolution. A neutron-imaging device with time resolution of 10 ns and aperture size of 40 cm × 60 cm was developed. It was filled with fast response liquid scintillator [1] in an aluminum honeycomb plate, which converts neutrons to optical light images. The scintillation light images were relayed using an optical lens and detected using a fast response image intensified CCD. The detector was tested at an electron linear accelerator (LINAC) facility in Osaka University. A short X-ray pulse (30 ps pulse duration) was generated using LINAC, and X-ray radiograph images were obtained with a 10- ns exposure time duration. The radiograph images were well attenuated within 10-ns from the X-ray injection. A high energy X-ray image and a neutron radiograph image of a 30-cm thick concrete block with iron blocks located behind it were successfully observed. This promising technique could facilitate nondestructive inspection of large concrete constructions.

Understanding the dynamics of rapidly varying electromagnetic fields in intense short pulse laser plasma interactions is of key importance to understand the mechanisms at the basis of a wide variety of physical processes, from high energy density physics and fusion science to the development of ultrafast laser plasma devices to control laser-generated particle beams. Target normal sheath accelerated (TNSA) proton radiography represents an ideal tool to diagnose ultrafast electromagnetic phenomena, providing 2D spatially and temporally resolved radiographs with temporal resolution varying from 2-3 ps to few tens of ps. In this work we introduce the proton radiography technique and its application to diagnose the spatial and temporal evolution of electromagnetic fields in laser-driven capacitor coil targets.

High-speed vision sensing becomes a driving factor in developing new methods for robotic manipulation. In this paper we present two such methods in order to realize high-performance manipulation. First, we present a dynamic compensation approach which aims to achieve simultaneously fast and accurate positioning under various (from system to external environment) uncertainties. Second, a high-speed motion strategy for manipulating flexible objects is introduced to address the issue of deformation uncertainties. Both methods rely on high-speed visual feedback and are model independent, which we believe is essential to ensure good flexibility in a wide range of applications. The high-speed visual feedback tracks the relative error between the working tool and the target in image coordinates, which implies that there is no need for accurate calibrations of the vision system. Tasks for validating these methods were implemented and experimental results were provided to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods.

Visual tracking of high-speed projectiles is required for studying the aerodynamics around the objects. One solution to this problem is a tracking method based on the so-called 1 ms Auto Pan-Tilt (1ms-APT) system that we proposed in previous work, which consists of rotational mirrors and a high-speed image processing system. However, the images obtained with that system did not have high enough resolution to realize detailed measurement of the projectiles because of the size of the mirrors. In this study, we propose a new system consisting of enlarged mirrors for tracking a high-speed projectiles so as to achieve higher-resolution imaging, and we confirmed the effectiveness of the system via an experiment in which a projectile flying at subsonic speed tracked.

The non-intrusive in-flight deformation measurement and the resulting local pitch of an aircraft propeller or helicopter rotor blade is a demanding task. The idea of an imaging system integrated and rotating with the air-craft propeller has already been presented at the 30th International Congress on High-Speed Imaging and Photonics (ICHSIP30) in 2012. Since then this system has been designed, constructed and tested in the laboratory as well as in-flight on the Cobra VUT100 of Evektor Aerotechnik, Kunovice (CZ). The major aim of the EU FP7 project AIM² ("Advanced In-flight Measurement techniques 2" – contract No. 266107) was to ascertain the feasibility of this technique under extreme conditions - vibration and large centrifugal forces – to real flight testing. Based on the gained experience a new rotating system for the application on helicopter rotors has recently been constructed and tested on the whirl tower of Airbus Helicopters, Donauwoerth (D). In this paper the principle of the applied Image Pattern Correlation Technique (IPCT), a specialized type of Digital Image Correlation (DIC), is outlined and the construction of both rotating 3D image acquisition systems dedicated to the in-flight deformation measurement of the aircraft propeller and helicopter rotor are described. Furthermore, the results of the ground and in-flight tests of these systems will be shown and discussed. The obtained results will be helpful for manufacturers in the design of their future aircrafts.

Particle Tracking Velocimetry, PTV, is one of the most powerful tools those can measure the deformation of fast flowing fluid, such as vorticity, shear rate, and so on, with a high-speed video camera. We have developed a new method to estimate vorticity from randomly located velocity vectors obtained by a PTV. The proposed method employs the Moving Least Square method that is developed for the meshless numerical simulation. The optimal size of fitting area of the proposed method is derived theoretically and is confirmed by the Monte Carlo simulation. The comparison of accuracy of the proposed method is carried out. The result shows that the proposed method is more accurate than the commonly used method in any case.

Simultaneous visualization technique of the combination of the unsteady Pressure-Sensitive Paint and the Schlieren measurement was introduced. It was applied to a wind tunnel test of a rocket faring model at the JAXA 2mx2m transonic wind tunnel. Quantitative unsteady pressure field was acquired by the unsteady PSP measurement, which consisted of a high-speed camera, high-power laser diode, and so on. Qualitative flow structure was acquired by the Schlieren measurement using a high-speed camera and Xenon lamp with a blue optical filter. Simultaneous visualization was achieved 1.6 kfps frame rate and it gave the detailed structure of unsteady flow fields caused by the unsteady shock wave oscillation due to shock-wave/boundary-layer interaction around the juncture between cone and cylinder on the model. Simultaneous measurement results were merged into a movie including surface pressure distribution on the rocket faring and spatial structure of shock wave system concerning to transonic buffet. Constructed movie gave a timeseries and global information of transonic buffet flow field on the rocket faring model visually.

The standard infrared camera has taken certain integration time with the photography per once, it was unsuitable for high-speed photography. By the infrared camera which can buffer photography data efficiently continually, high-speed photography of 2,000fps is enabled in 320X240 pixels and 11,000fps in128X100 pixels by windowing mode. The heat generation of specimen phenomenon is used for the monitoring of the start point of the destruction and the thermometry of combustion gases.

Thermal plasmas are expected to be utilized for a number of industrial applications, such as nanomaterial synthesis and waste treatment. The thermal plasma generation and its characteristics remain to be explored for more attractive processing. In particular, the electrode dynamics are one of the most considerable issues for the practical use of industrial applications, because it determines the electrode lifetime and the performance of materials in thermal plasmas. High-speed imaging provides a powerful tool to reveal the plasma dynamics. High-speed video camera with bandpass filter system was used to measure the electrode temperature as well as the arc fluctuation. Electrode temperature was evaluated from the radiation intensities at 785 nm and 880 nm from the electrode thermal emission. This system can be also applied to observe the dynamic behavior of vapor generation from the electrode on the millisecond time scale. Emissions from tungsten vapor were observed at the wavelength of 393 nm. The tungsten electrode started to evaporate just after the peak top of the arc current in the anodic period. The tungsten vapor became the main species in the anodic arc when the electrode started to evaporate. In contrast, a small amount of tungsten evaporation was observed during the cathodic period. These experimental studies enable us to understand the electrode erosion mechanism of the multiphase AC arc. Fundamental researches for electrode phenomena determining thermal plasma characteristics lead to the development of innovative industrial applications of material processing and waste treatment.

The lean combustion is one of the key techniques for the advanced internal combustion systems due to the requirement of the higher thermal efficiency. Since the successful ignition must be guaranteed even in the lean combustion, advanced ignition systems have been developed in this decade. Laser ignition is one of the advanced ignition systems which have the profits of the flexibility in the position and the timing of ignition. To develop this ignition system for the actual combustion system, it is required to reveal the underlying physics of the laser ignition. Particularly, the time evolution of high temperature region formed by laser induced breakdown should be discussed. In this study, therefore, the time evolution of the high temperature region formed by the laser induced breakdown and the development of flame kernel were observed by using high-speed imaging. The ignition trials of methane/air lean premixed mixture were carried out in the constant volume combustion vessel to obtain minimum laser pulse energy for ignition (MPE). Results showed that the light emission from plasma formed by laser induced breakdown remained at least in several tens nano-seconds. In addition, there were large differences between the breakdown threshold and the MPE, which meant that the breakdown threshold did not determine the minimum pulse energy for ignition.

The flame observed during the sudden release of high-pressure hydrogen into a tube filled with air, in the absence of an igniter, has not yet been investigated. In this study, the self-ignition and flame development behavior of high-pressure hydrogen flow in a tube is investigated to obtain fundamental knowledge for safety engineering. Two high-speed cameras are used simultaneously to obtain density gradient data from the shadowgraph image and flame dynamics from the direct image. Self-ignition occurs at the point near the sidewall in the region where cold hydrogen and preheated air are mixed by the precursor shock wave. After ignition, the flame propagates along the wall surface and spreads throughout the mixing region.

We have developed a real-time holographic interferometry system with high-speed camera in order to visualize two dimensional, time-dependent temperature distributions in gas and solid phases simultaneously during the combustion of transparent thermoplastic material. The ultimate goal of this study is to contribute to upgrade the flame spread modeling at which the complex physical processes (e.g., fuel regression, bubble formation, motion inside the molten layer) have been mostly ignored, although those effect are not so well-known and not well-studied. As first step, thermal response of thermoplastic material subjected to the disturbance in gas phase was investigated. Thick transparent PMMA slab was used as sample specimen and the thermal status in gas, molten and solid phases over spreading flame downwardly was examined. Whole optical set was carefully arranged and tuned to obtain satisfactory clear interference fringes appeared in gas and solid phases during the combustion event. Following the disturbance introduced in the system, the time change of refractive index in gas, molten and solid phases and the corresponding temperature distributions was recorded via a high-speed camera. Response delay time was carefully analyzed to discuss the potential role of the liquid phase on the burning character.

In this paper, we introduce a novel technique to measure the unsteady feature of turbulent heat transfer using high-speed infrared thermograph. High-speed imaging is necessary to capture the unsteady feature since the turbulent heat transfer is originated from the turbulent vortical structure which fluctuates in high speed and in complicated manners. The experimental technique was introduced here to measure the turbulent heat transfer, and presented an example of quantitative variation of spatio-temporal heat transfer, which has not been clarified experimentally so far. In addition, the requirement to the infrared thermograph to capture the sufficient fine structure was discussed.

We used a multi-hole injector to spray isooctane under atmospheric conditions and observed droplet impingement behaviors. It is generally known that droplet impact regimes such as splashing, deposition, or bouncing are governed by the Weber number. However, owing to its complexity, little has been reported on microscopic visualization of poly-dispersed spray. During the spray impingement process, a large number of droplets approach, hit, then interact with the wall. It is therefore difficult to focus on a single droplet and observe the impingement process. We solved this difficulty using high-speed microscopic visualization. The spray/wall interaction processes were recorded by a high-speed camera (Shimadzu HPV-X2) with a long-distance microscope. We captured several impinging microscopic droplets. After optimizing the magnification and frame rate, the atomization behaviors, splashing and deposition, were recorded. Then, we processed the images obtained to determine droplet parameters such as the diameter, velocity, and impingement angle. Based on this information, the critical threshold between splashing and deposition was investigated in terms of the normal and parallel components of the Weber number with respect to the wall. The results suggested that, on a dry wall, we should set the normal critical Weber number to 300.

The simple phenomenon of a water drop falling onto a glass plate may seem like a trivial fluid mechanics problem. However, detailed imaging has shown that this process is highly complex and a small air-bubble is always entrapped under the drop when it makes contact with the solid. This bubble can interfere with the uniformity of spray coatings and degrade inkjet fabrication of displays etc. We will describe how we use high-speed interferometry at 5 million frames per second to understand the details of this process. As the impacting drop approaches the solid, the dynamics are characterized by a balance between the lubrication pressure in the thin air layer and the inertia of the bot-tom of the drop. This deforms the drop, forming a dimple at its bottom and making the drop touch the surface along a ring, thereby entrapping the air-layer, which is typically 1-3 μm thick. This air-layer can be highly compressed and the deceleration of the bottom of the drop can be as large as 300,000 g. We describe how the thickness evolution of the lubricating air-layer is extracted from following the interference fringes between frames. Two-color interferometry is also used to extract absolute layer thicknesses. Finally, we identify the effects of nanometric surface roughness on the first contact of the drop with the substrate. Here we need to resolve the 100 nm thickness changes occurring during 200 ns intervals, requiring these state of the art high-speed cameras. Surprisingly, we see a ring of micro-bubbles marking the first contact of the drop with the glass, only for microscope slides, which have a typical roughness of 20 nm, while such rings are absent for drop impacts onto molecularly smooth mica surfaces.

The present study is concerned with the cavitation inception and the growth of a cavitation bubble cloud by the backscattering of focused ultrasound from a laser-induced bubble. The cavitation inception close to the interface of a laser-induced bubble has been observed by a high-speed video camera with the frame rate of up to 1.25 Mfps, and its location and the successive cavitation cloud growth are discussed for various ultrasound conditions. It is shown that the normalized distance between the cavitation inception location and the bubble interface by the wavelength of ultrasound is an increasing function of η = t₀ / t_s where the time t₀ is the characteristic time for cavitation bubble collapse and the time t_s the period of ultrasound. Also the magnitude of the dimensionless distance is about 0.05-0.3 times of the wavelength of ultrasound, and the positive pressure threshold of ultrasound for a cavitation inception is about 35 MPa. It is also shown that the cavitation bubble cloud by the backscattering of the incident ultrasound grows conically along the propagation axis of the focused ultrasound. As the incident focused ultrasound pressure at the focus becomes stronger or the duration of the focused ultrasound becomes longer, the cavitation bubble cloud grows larger. However, even though the ultrasound duration becomes longer, this growth ends up and reaches a limited value when the cavitation bubble cloud grows out of the focal region of the focused ultrasound.

We focus on condensation process of vapor bubble exposed to a pooled liquid of subcooled conditions. Two different geometries are employed in the present research; one is the evaporation on the heated surface, that is, subcooled pool boiling, and the other the injection of vapor into the subcooled pool. The test fluid is water, and all series of the experiments are conducted under the atmospheric pressure condition. The degree of subcooling is ranged from 10 to 40 K. Through the boiling experiment, unique phenomenon known as microbubble emission boiling (MEB) is introduced; this phenomenon realizes heat flux about 10 times higher than the critical heat flux. Condensation of the vapor bubble is the key phenomenon to supply ambient cold liquid to the heated surface. In order to understand the condensing process in the MEB, we prepare vapor in the vapor generator instead of the evaporation on the heated surface, and inject the vapor to expose the vapor bubble to the subcooled liquid. Special attention is paid to the dynamics of the vapor bubble detected by the high-speed video camera, and on the enhancement of the heat transfer due to the variation of interface area driven by the condensation.

Splashing, as a result of the drop impact onto a liquid film, occurs in various natural phenomena and technical processes. Examples include rain drops impacting on the ground, fuel injection impacting chamber walls, spray cleaning, spray cooling, or spray coating. Inertia, viscous and capillary forces determine the impact outcome if both liquids are the same. In the case of two different liquids, also the miscibility and the interfacial forces influence the drop impact phenomenon. This latter case is much less understood. The main objective of the present experimental work is to elucidate the impact phenomena of a single Newtonian drop onto a liquid wall film of different viscosity. The experimental setup consist of a drop-on-demand drop generator, a wetted, horizontal, glass substrate, and an observation system, consisting of the illumination source and a high-speed video camera. A high frame rate of up to 40,000 fps is used to investigate the impact dynamics of the fluids and to observe the fluid distribution after the drop impact. The liquid of the drop is marked by a dye to distinguish liquid interfaces. The viscosity and surface tension of the two liquids are varied. The drop and wall liquids are not miscible. The experiments revealed several interesting phenomena, typical only to the case of collision of different liquids.

This paper reports a preliminarily experimental result of high-speed shadowgraph optical visualization of underwater expansion wave focusing by using a simple two-dimensional wedge model for understanding of shock wave interaction phenomena in simulated biomedical materials. Underwater shock wave generated by detonating a micro-explosive (10 mg silver azide pellet) in a small chamber. The generated underwater shock wave was interacted with a wedge shaped interface between water and air divided by a thin film, and an expansion wave was generated by reflection at the interface. The process of underwater expansion wave generation and focusing phenomena was visualized by shadowgraph method and recorded by ultra-high-speed framing camera. Underwater shock wave was reflected as an expansion wave from the interface between water and air at the both side and focused and then cavitation bubble was created by pressure decreasing at the expansion wave focusing area. The pressure histories were measured simultaneously with high-speed optical visualization by a needle type pressure sensor. At the focusing area, the pressure was decreased rapidly, the negative peak pressure was the lowest.

As proposed and legislated in Japan, subsurface magazines have an explosive storage chamber, a horizontal passageway, and a vertical shaft for a vent. The authors found that a small amount of water on the floor of the storage chamber mitigated blast pressure remarkably. The mitigation mechanism has been examined more closely. To examine the effect of water, the present study assesses explosions in a transparent, square cross section, and a straight tube. A high-speed camera used to observe the tube interior. Blast pressure in and around the tube was also measured. Images obtained using the high-speed camera revealed that water inside the tube did not move after the explosion. Differences between cases of tubes without water and with water were unclear. Along with blast pressure measurements, these study results suggest that blast pressure mitigation by water occurs because of interaction between the explosion and the water near the explosion point.

The Background Oriented Schlieren (BOS) technique is one of the novel measurement techniques and its application range is very wide. The principle of BOS is similar to that of the conventional schlieren technique, it exploits the bending of light ray caused by a refractive-index change corresponding to the density change in the medium. The BOS technique allows the quantitative measurement of density with very simple experimental setup and proper image analysis. Only a background and a digital camera are required for the experiment, so that even the real scale experiments can be realized. In recent years, the development of the high-speed camera is remarkable and so many high-speed phenomena can now be captured. To realize the precise measurement with BOS technique using high-speed camera, higher resolution (larger number of pixels) is desirable.

In this paper, with a technical support from Nobby Tech Ltd., a 4K high-speed camera (4096 × 2160 pixels) is applied to the BOS measurement of the lateral jet/cross flow interaction filed in the supersonic wind tunnel test as a trial of the quantitative density measurement with higher resolution. The measurement system consists of a 4K high-speed camera and a pulsed laser for background illumination. A telecentric optical system is also employed to improve the spatial resolution of the measurement. The measurement results of BOS technique up to 1000 fps with higher resolution are discussed.

Experiments were conducted in a shock tube in order to determine the increases in shock wave strength due to reductions in area. Previous work has shown that if the reduction is too sudden significant wave reflections occur and gains are limited. A variety of curved symmetrical contractions are used, made up of parabolic surfaces with different points of inflection. High-speed Schlieren imaging was used to characterize the wave patterns with particular emphasis on wave reflections. Greatest wave amplification is present when Mach reflection of the wave is not reached at all, and this was found to occur with parabolic profiles with inflection point at 60% of the profile length. Clear Mach reflection is evident with the inflection point at 40% and the post shock flow shows significant reflected waves with their associated losses. With an area reduction of 80% and a inflection point at 60% of the contraction, a typical result gives an increase in Mach number from 1.6 to 2.0, corresponding to a 61% increase in post-shock pressure. It is found that profiles with later inflection points provide a more gradual initial area change and allow weaker compression waves to develop which can significantly reduce or even avoid transition to Mach reflection.

Experiments were conducted in a shock tube to determine the effect of planar wedge inlet geometry on the shock wave reflection pattern that occurred on a wedge. High-speed schlieren imaging was used to visualize the experiments conducted in air with a nominal incident shock strength of Mach 1.31. The experimental test pieces consisted of a wedge mounted above the floor of the shock tube where the underside wedge angle was varied. The upper wedge angle was fixed at 30°, resulting in a Mach reflection. The underside wedge angle was either 30° or 90°, corresponding to a conventional and blunt wedge respectively. For the cases presented here, the reflected shock from the initial interaction reflects off of the shock tube floor and diffracts around the wedge apex. A density gradient is formed at the wedge apex due to this process and results in a vortex being shed for the 90° wedge. It was shown by simple measurements that the diffracted wave could reach the triple point of the upper Mach reflection if the wedge were of sufficient length.

Recent improvements in camera technology and the associated improved access to high-speed camera equipment have made it possible to use high-speed imaging not only in a research environment but also specifically for educational purposes. This includes high-speed sequences that are created both with and for a target audience of students in high schools and universities. The primary goal is to engage students in scientific exploration by providing them with a tool that allows them to see and measure otherwise inaccessible phenomena. High-speed imaging has the potential to stimulate students’ curiosity as the results are often surprising or may contradict initial assumptions. “Live” demonstrations in class or student- run experiments are highly suitable to have a profound influence on student learning. Another aspect is the production of high-speed images for demonstration purposes. While some of the approaches known from the application of high speed imaging in a research environment can simply be transferred, additional techniques must often be developed to make the results more easily accessible for the targeted audience. This paper describes a range of student-centered activities that can be undertaken which demonstrate how student engagement and learning can be enhanced through the use of high speed imaging using readily available technologies.

High-speed flow visualisation has played an important role in the investigations conducted at the Stoßwellenlabor of the RWTH Aachen University for many decades. In addition to applying the techniques of high-speed imaging, this laboratory has been actively developing new or enhanced visualisation techniques and approaches such as various schlieren methods or time-resolved Mach-Zehnder interferometry. The investigated high-speed flows are inherently highly transient, with flow Mach numbers ranging from about M = 0.7 to M = 8. The availability of modern high-speed cameras has allowed us to expand the investigations into problems where reduced reproducibility had so far limited the amount of information that could be extracted from a limited number of flow visualisation records. Following a brief historical overview, some examples of recent studies are given, which represent the breadth of applications in which high-speed imaging has been an essential diagnostic tool to uncover the physics of high-speed flows. Applications include the stability of hypersonic corner flows, the establishment of shock wave systems in transonic airfoil flow, and the complexities of the interactions of shock waves with obstacles of various shapes.

The rotational behavior of capsule-shaped models is investigated in the transonic wind tunnel of JAXA. A special support is developed to allow the model to rotate around the pitch, yaw and roll axes. This 3-DOF free rotational mounting apparatus achieves the least frictional torque from the support and the instruments. Two types of capsule models are prepared, one is drag type (SPH model) and the other is lift type (HTV-R model). The developed mounting apparatus is used in the wind tunnel tests with these capsule models. In a flow of Mach 0.9, the SPH model exhibits oscillations in pitch and yaw, and it rolls half a turn during the test. Similarly, the HTV-R model exhibits pitch and yaw oscillations in a flow of Mach 0.5. Moreover, it rolls multiple times during the test. In order to investigate the flow field around the capsule, the combined technique of color schlieren and surface tufts is applied. This visualization clearly shows the flow reattachment on the back surface of a capsule, which is suspected to induce the rapid rolling motion.

Structured Light Systems (SLS) give access, without contact, to a rich measurement of a cloud of points belonging to a same object surface. SLS received much interest in the past years and became a standard technique. The aim of this talk is to present the design of such a means, working in the visible spectrum, dedicated to shock physics (implying velocities up to several km/s) and to provide an example of measurements with a 3D reconstruction. A dedicated development is necessary (laser lighting, speckle smoothing, ambient light canceling, depth of field improvement), since commonly developed SLS don’t suit this field of study, mainly for three reasons: phenomena of interest (usually lasting a few microseconds) require extremely short exposure durations (few nanoseconds to few hundreds of picoseconds); the field of view ranges from millimeter for samples shocked by high power lasers to decimeter for high-explosive setups ; and finally, experimentations have single-shot acquisitions. The main domains of study are fragmentations, surface deformations and associated damages, like micro-spalling or ejected particle clouds.

There are a number of industrial applications of laser ablation in a gas atmosphere. When an intense pulsed laser beam is irradiated on a solid surface in the gas atmosphere, the surface material is ablated and expands into the atmosphere. At the same time, a spherical shock wave is launched by the ablation jet to induce the unsteady flow around the target surface. The ablated materials, luminously working as tracer, exhibit strange unsteady motions depending on the experimental conditions. By using a high-speed video camera (HPV-X2), unsteady motion ablated materials are visualized at the frame rate more than 10⁶ fps, and qualitatively characterized.

Image analysis with ultra-high-speed camera and two dimensional dynamic numerical analysis are applied to study the rapid unstable growth of wing crack under the uniaxial compression. Growing wing crack terminates and restarts its unstable rapid growth in some cases. Such a termination and restart behavior of the growing crack is studied through the experiment and numerical analysis in this work. First, rectangle transparent specimen, including the initial crack inclined to the compressive axis, is subjected to the uniaxial compression till the wing cracks start unstable rapid growth from both ends of the initial crack. Images of growing cracks and those of stress distribution, visualized as the photo-elastic fringe pattern, are captured by the high speed camera with the frame rate of 500k frames per second. The behavior of growing crack and the change in the stress field due to the crack growth are discussed through the captured images. Next, two dimensional dynamic numerical analysis is carried out. PDS-FEM (Particle Discretization Scheme), which allows the discontinuity of the displacement in the continuous analytical domain, is combined with the central difference time integration scheme to simulate the rapid unstable growth of the wing crack dynamically. The accuracy of the proposed simulation is discussed through the comparison with the images, captured by the experiment.

The dynamic strain distribution of a fiber re-enforced plastic (FRP) plate under blast loading was investigated using a Digital Image Correlation (DIC) image analysis method. The testing FRP plates were mounted in parallel to each other on a steel frame. 50 g of composition C4 explosive was used as a blast loading source and set in the center of the FRP plates. The dynamic behavior of the FRP plate under blast loading were observed by two high-speed video cameras. The set of two high-speed video image sequences were used to analyze the FRP three-dimensional strain distribution by means of DIC method. A point strain profile extracted from the analyzed strain distribution data was compared with a directly observed strain profile using a strain gauge and it was shown that the strain profile under the blast loading by DIC method is quantitatively accurate.

Impact processes are highly transient processes requiring high time resolution for diagnostics techniques. Fraunhofer EMI performs impact and other highly dynamic experiments under laboratory conditions, allowing close-proximity observation of events with the dissipation of high amounts of energy leading to failure of structure and materials upon extreme dynamic loading.

High-speed camera techniques have improved massively over the last decades, especially the capability for microsecond video. This development has paralleled the evolvement of the tools for the numerical simulation of impact processes. The presentation reviews many examples from various research projects and shows how the application of high-speed imaging has evolved over the years and how it has brought in-situ insights into the dynamics of impact processes, accompanied by the complementary use of flash X-ray diagnostics.

This gives insight into the material response of different classes of materials upon impact and provides a thorough base for modeling dynamic material behavior including failure.

High-speed impact on spacecraft by space debris poses a threat. When a high-speed projectile collides with target, it is conceivable that the heat created by impact causes severe damage at impact point. Investigation of the temperature is necessary for elucidation of high-speed impact phenomena. However, it is very difficult to measure the temperature with standard methods for two main reasons. One reason is that a thermometer placed on the target is instantaneously destroyed upon impact. The other reason is that there is not enough time resolution to measure the transient temperature changes. In this study, the measurement of plasma induced by high-speed impact was investigated to estimate temperature changes near the impact point. High-speed impact experiments were performed with a vertical gas gun. The projectile speed was approximately 700 m/s, and the target material was A5052. The experimental data to calculate the plasma parameters of electron temperature and electron density were measured by triple probe method. In addition, the diffusion behavior of plasma was observed by optical visualization technique using high-speed camera. The frame rate and the exposure time were 260 kfps and 1.0 μs, respectively. These images are considered to be one proof to show the validity of plasma measurement. The experimental results showed that plasma signals were detected for around 70 μs, and the rising phase of the wave form was in good agreement with timing of optical visualization image when the plasma arrived at the tip of triple probe.

Explosive welding, one of the high energy rate material processing, is known the technique to weld strongly for the dissimilar metal combinations. When a metal is collided to the other metal at high velocity with a certain angle, good welding is achieved in this technique. Important parameters of the explosive welding method are the collision velocity and the collision angle. And it is necessary to know these parameters to obtain the explosively welded materials of several metals combinations. However, the optical observation for the collision of metal plate accelerated by the explosive is difficult because of the obstruction by the spreading of detonation gas. In the present work a single-stage powder gun and high speed video camera were used to observe the inclined collision of metals at the high velocity. Projectile consisted by a metal disc and sabot was accelerated by the deflagration of a gunpowder and was collided to another metal disc set with a certain angle. Metal jet was generated at the collision point when the projectile was collided to the target disc in the range of suitable conditions. By using this observation system, a series of the flow from the high speed collision to the generation of metal jet could be taken photographs clearly. This investigation shows the experimental results of the similar and dissimilar metal collision, with comparing the visualization of a metal jet simulated numerically.

Directly observing protein molecules in dynamic action at high spatiotemporal resolution has long been a holy grail for biological science. To materialize this long quested dream, I have been developing high-speed atomic force microscopy (HS-AFM) since 1993. Tremendous strides were recently accomplished in its high-speed and low-invasive performances. Consequently, various dynamic molecular actions, including bipedal walking of myosin V and rotary propagation of structural changes in F₁-ATPase, were successfully captured on video. The visualized dynamic images not only provided irrefutable evidence for speculated actions of the protein molecules but also brought new discoveries inaccessible with other approaches, thus giving great mechanistic insights into how the molecules function. HS-AFM is now transforming “static” structural biology into dynamic structural bioscience.

In this study, we use four high-speed video cameras to investigate the swing characteristics of the kicking leg while delivering the knuckling shot in soccer. We attempt to elucidate the impact process of the kicking foot at the instant of its impact with the ball and the technical mechanisms of the knuckling shot via comparison of its curved motion with that of the straight and curved shots. Two high-speed cameras (Fastcam, Photron Inc., Tokyo, Japan; 1000 fps, 1024 × 1024 pixels) are set up 2 m away from the site of impact with a line of sight perpendicular to the kicking-leg side. In addition, two semi-high-speed cameras (EX-F1, Casio Computer Co., Ltd., Tokyo, Japan; 300 fps; 720 × 480 pixels) are positioned, one at the rear and the other on the kicking-leg side, to capture the kicking motion. We observe that the ankle joint at impact in the knuckling shot flexes in an approximate L-shape in a manner similar to the joint flexing for the curve shot. The hip’s external rotation torque in the knuckling shot is greater than those of other shots, which suggests the tendency of the kicker to push the heel forward and impact with the inside of the foot. The angle of attack in the knuckling shot is smaller than that in other shots, and we speculate that this small attack angle is a factor in soccer kicks which generate shots with smaller rotational frequencies of the ball.

Because escape from a net cage and mortality are constant problems in fish farming, health control and management of facilities are important in aquaculture. In particular, the development of an accurate fish counting system has been strongly desired for the Pacific Bluefin tuna farming industry owing to the high market value of these fish. The current fish counting method, which involves human counting, results in poor accuracy; moreover, the method is cumbersome because the aquaculture net cage is so large that fish can only be counted when they move to another net cage. Therefore, we have developed an automated fish counting system by applying particle tracking velocimetry (PTV) analysis to a shoal of swimming fish inside a net cage. In essence, we treated the swimming fish as tracer particles and estimated the number of fish by analyzing the corresponding motion vectors. The proposed fish counting system comprises two main components: image processing and motion analysis, where the image-processing component abstracts the foreground and the motion analysis component traces the individual’s motion. In this study, we developed a Region Extraction and Centroid Computation (RECC) method and a Kalman filter and Chi-square (KC) test for the two main components. To evaluate the efficiency of our method, we constructed a closed system, placed an underwater video camera with a spherical curved lens at the bottom of the tank, and recorded a 360° view of a swimming school of Japanese rice fish (Oryzias latipes). Our study showed that almost all fish could be abstracted by the RECC method and the motion vectors could be calculated by the KC test. The recognition rate was approximately 90% when more than 180 individuals were observed within the frame of the video camera. These results suggest that the presented method has potential application as a fish counting system for industrial aquaculture.

Two high-speed video cameras are successfully used to detect the motion of a flying shuttlecock of badminton. The shuttlecock detection system is applied to badminton robots that play badminton fully autonomously. The detection system measures the three dimensional position and velocity of a flying shuttlecock, and predicts the position where the shuttlecock falls to the ground. The badminton robot moves quickly to the position where the shuttle-cock falls to, and hits the shuttlecock back into the opponent’s side of the court. In the game of badminton, there is a large audience, and some of them move behind a flying shuttlecock, which are a kind of background noise and makes it difficult to detect the motion of the shuttlecock. The present study demonstrates that such noises can be eliminated by the method of stereo imaging with two high-speed cameras.