News

Altechna published a broader reflection on the optics industry’s shift towards highly customised components designed for specific environments, such as high‑vibration platforms or extreme temperatures.
The company’s expertise in phase‑control optics, ultra‑low‑absorption CW laser coatings and robust optomechanical assemblies underpins several elements used in EULIAA’s lidar systems.
This development illustrates how advances in custom optics directly benefit ambitious research infrastructures like EULIAA.

EULIAA’s novel atmospheric lidar system took part in a first comparative measurement campaign with the HALO research aircraft during the HALO‑South mission.
On 20 August 2025, HALO overflew IAP Kühlungsborn while EULIAA lidars and radars operated from the ground, enabling combined airborne and ground‑based observations of atmospheric dynamics and aerosols.
Despite vacation season, the team rapidly prepared the instruments; the resulting dataset will be used to verify lidar performance and to obtain a multi‑dimensional view of atmospheric processes.

The first complete atmospheric lidar unit developed within EULIAA, operating in the infrared, has been fully assembled, commissioned and successfully tested at the Leibniz Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IAP).

All subsystems – including the diode‑pumped Alexandrite IR laser, control software and safety systems – were integrated into the mobile housing, and the system was moved outside to the testing range. Initial atmospheric measurements demonstrated:

• operation with three tilted fields of view plus an additional depolarisation channel,
• high‑quality signals from aerosols (Mie scattering) up to about 30 km and from air molecules (Rayleigh scattering) up to about 50 km, and
• signatures from metal layers at around 85–95 km altitude.

These first results confirm that the IR lidar unit meets its design goals and is ready for long‑term testing and subsequent deployment to remote campaign sites within the EULIAA network.

Fraunhofer ILT has delivered the first prototype of a diode‑pumped Alexandrite UV laser for the EULIAA project to the Leibniz Institute of Atmospheric Physics (IAP) in Kühlungsborn.
The laser operates in single‑frequency mode at 386 nm with pulse energies up to 2.5 mJ at 750 Hz and has been designed specifically for use in the EULIAA UV lidar system.

After delivery, the laser was integrated into the dedicated lidar setup at IAP. This marks a key step towards a fully operational UV lidar unit that will extend EULIAA’s measurement capabilities into the ultraviolet spectral range and support future high‑altitude profiling campaigns across Europe.

At Laser World of Photonics in Munich, Fraunhofer ILT presented a prototype of the tunable UV laser developed in the EULIAA project:

• The laser was showcased at the main Fraunhofer booth (A3.431), alongside other photonics innovations.
• Visitors were invited to learn about its role in atmospheric lidar systems for high‑altitude wind and temperature measurements.

Several posts documented the preparation, booth setup and live demonstrations, highlighting strong interest from the photonics community in EULIAA’s laser technology.