Status quo and trend of infrared system and technologies for America′s ballistic missile defense system

Infrared sensors play an important role to every layer of ballistic missile defense system(including surveillance,early warning of ballistic missile launching,discrimination of warhead and decoys,warhead tracking and intercepting).Infrared FPA technology is the most key supporting technology for the infrared sensors of ballistic missile defense system.America′s ballistic missile defense system has evolved from conceiving to realization over the last 20 years.One of the most important reasons is that there has been a great breakthrough in the infrared sensors for ballistic missile defense system.At present,the infrared sensors and kinetic kill vehicles′ infrared seeker of ballistic missile defense system have evolved from previous infrared detector linear array based system(or smaller format infrared FPA based system) to larger format infrared FPA based system.The performance of the infrared sensors and the interceptors' infrared seeker have been improved greatly.But,on account of the complexity of ballistic missile defense,current ballistic missile defense system is still a primary system.As a result,USA is still developing and improving its ballistic missile defense system,including developing more advanced infrared FPAs and improving infrared sensors and kinetic kill vehicles′ infrared seeker.In this paper,a review of the current status and future trend of infrared systems and technologies for America′s ballistic missile defense system is presented.