Within the development of complex opto-electronic systems system theory and verification are considered at the beginning and at the end of the developing cycle. Therefore the importance of the tasks of the working group for the physical design of sensor systems and for the fulfilment of user's requirements with suitable high quality is accordingly high. With the steadily rising complexity of sensor systems the complexity and the expenditure of the verification and validation also grow.
System theory deals with the description of the signal from the source of radiation up to the digitization. The way from photon, to electron to byte is traced. The single components of the complex system (e.g., the sun, atmosphere, optics, electronics) are characterised by physical models. According to demand easy or complicated models are taken into consideration. A computer-aided system simulation describes the interaction of these parameters and permits an optimisation of the sensor parameters, the observation conditions and retrieval algorithms.
The goal of the verification of optical sensor systems is the examination of defined user's requirements. With complex opto-electronic systems optical, electronic, mechanical and software requirements exist. Their verification requires understanding of the system, and interdisciplinary cooperation. The methods which are used for verification are obtained from model-supported analyses, simulations (e.g., mechanically, electronically, thermal) and test runs up to calibration.
In order to guarantee the ability for reproduction of measuring results and for the acceleration of the processes ,the working group develops concepts to ensure more efficiently verification processes, e.g. by development novel methods of the verification and calibration or to the lab automation.