Software for Multidisciplinary Analysis of Optical Systems

Integrated Modeling of Optical Systems (IMOS) is a MATLAB™ computer program that provides many functions for analysis of a system represented by mathematical models of its thermal, structural, control, and/or optical aspects. For example, IMOS can be used to study thermal distortion of structural components of an optical instrument and the resulting degradation of optical performance. Heretofore, such an analysis would have entailed the use of separate programs to perform thermal, structural, control, and optical sub-analyses. The uniqueness of IMOS lies in the possibility of performing the entire analysis in one program. The common MATLAB!" software environment offers several advantages, including capabilities for optimizing the design of a system on the basis of multidisciplinary (e.g., thermal and optical) criteria and a capability for optimizing the designing of the control subsystem. IMOS provides interfaces between itself and several other programs, including NASTRAN to IMOS, IMOS to SINDA, IMOS to TSS, and IMOS to MACOS. Both MATLAB and IMOS have plotting capabilities that assist in visualization of results.