The lidar laboratory and the optical laboratory are two facilities operating at CIAO observatory, installed in late 2022 and in the optimization phase.

Lidar laboratory

Lidar laboratory is a flexible modular facility able to setup and test different lidar configurations. The facility is equipped with three laser sources: one Nd:YAG laser able to emit at 1064, 532 and 355 nm (10 Hz repetition rate), one Nd:YAG laser, equipped with amplifier and SLM option, able to work at one emission wavelength (1064 nm or 532 nm or 355 nm) selectable through beam-dumpers (10 Hz repetition rate), and one SLM Single Frequency DPSS laser with locked stabilized wavelength at 532 nm (1-15 kHz repetition rate and BW < 60 MHz).

The facility is equipped with two selectable Cassegrainian telescopes (400 mm and 200 mm primary mirror diameters). Telescopes could also mounted on a mobile module for scanning measurements outside. Both biaxial and coaxial configurations can be used.

Pre-build and easily mountable modules are available for aerosol backscattering and depolarization measurements at 1064, 532 and 355 nm, vibrational Raman measurements for Nitrogen and water vapour at 607, 387 and 407 nm, elastic + rotational Raman (RR) at 532 and 355 nm, temperature at 355 nm, HSRL measurements using the SLM laser stabilized with locked frequency on a iodine absorption line (532 nm), time resolved fluorescence.

For fluorescence measurements, a multispectral lidar detector and a spectrometer for simultaneous detection of multiple wavelengths is available. This is based on a spectrometer Shamrock A-SR-750, operating in the range 300-850 nm, and on a multi anode PMT detector (32-channel single photon counting, up to 0.3 nm/channel resolution).

The facility is equipped also with detectors, filters, CCD cameras, posts, mounts, laser dumpers, beam expanders and several electronic, optical and mechanical tools.

The facility is part of the instrumentation offered by the ACTRIS Central Facility CARS (Centre for Aerosol Remote Sensing) through the Italian node of CIAO observatory.

Optical laboratory

Optical laboratory is a facility addressed to characterize the optical components that are typically used in high power lidar systems (AHL). The laboratory is hosted in a 20 feet thermally insulated container with negative pressurized and temperature control room to prevent dust contamination.

The facility is equipped with LEM for laser, beam expander, mirror, dichroic depolarization characterization, stabilized optical bench, fast oscilloscope (500MHz, 5 Gs/s), research Xenon Light Source, Laser Beam Profiler, wavemeter with absolute accuracy better than 200 MHz, Laser Spectrum Analyzer (192-1180 nm), laser energy and power meter, bench power supply, bench pulse generator, alignment lasers, and also with instrument to test and measure the A/D linearity developed in the frame of EARLINET.

The facility is part of the instrumentation offered by the ACTRIS Central Facility CARS (Centre for Aerosol Remote Sensing) through the Italian node of CIAO observatory.