A new anti stealth technology
Schlieren Signature[edit]
Schlieren photograph of T-38 shock waves
Schlieren-Soldering-Iron-Heat. Note that the soldering iron tip itself is not glowing because it is not Infrared photography. Had the photograph been a composite of
Schlieren and
infrared, the soldering iron tip would show as a source of illumination and the atmospheric disturbance caused by the heating would show as well. The infrared point of origin or target would be unambiguous.
Photography of bow shock waves around a brass bullet, 1888
Schlieren is the German plural of
schliere, which is German for the English word
streak. Schlieren are
visible streaks produced in a transparent medium as a result of variations in the medium's density leading to variations in refractive index.[23] Anything that disturbs the atmosphere may be detected (
Schlieren Photography) because of the
Schlieren effect caused by that
atmospheric disturbance. This type of
Measurement and signature intelligence (MASINT) detection falls under the category of
Electro-optical MASINT. A telephoto or telescopic picture of a jet passing between the photographer and a full moon will sometimes show the outline of the aircraft as well as the atmospheric distortions of the exhaust plumes. This passive principle can be used at all wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum. Passive signature intelligence has captured stealth aircraft in flight by accident, when such aircraft fly between Earth imaging satellites and ground (can be seen in products like
Google Earth). Once a stealth signature has been captured, it may be loaded into a database library for an active and live satellite search at any point in the future. Ground at past versus ground at present differential comparisons can be made to determine flight paths and altitudes of stealth aircraft. This disturbance and disturbing influence method has been used for finding ships at sea through wake generation tracking and even in
Wilson cloud chambers for particle discovery and tracking. The key principle is that the disturbance is much more visible in area and volume than the disturbing point source and converges attention to the much smaller disturbing source.