Abstract

Assuming Poisson statistics for object and background image shot noise and detector dark noise, exact expressions are derived for the mean and the standard deviation (called the noise equivalent angle of a noise-subtracted centroid image-position estimator assumed to use the output of a focal plane array. The derived expressions are examined to determine (1) the dependence of the noise equivalent angle on the signal and the noise, (2) the relative performance of a noise-subtracted versus a non-noise-subtracted estimator, and (3) the optimum pixel-to-spot-size ratio.

© 1992 Optical Society of America

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