LIDAR: Sensing multiple applications for every industry

 A LIDAR system is at its high performance when the components are included within small and efficient power management

Rapid advancements in technology have unlocked unprecedented possibilities for capturing the physical world in a more compact digital form. The advent of new technologies like LIDAR-- Light Detection and Ranging has allowed several companies and application systems to conduct geographical surveys, 3D structural mapping and object recognition. Industries such as manufacturing automation, safety, agriculture, and several others are adopting LIDAR to improve efficiencies, create safer environments, drive down costs and even do things that were not possible before.

To unlock the immense possibilities that LIDAR has to offer to industries across sectors, it is important to first understand what LIDAR means. In layman’s terms, LIDAR is a system that bounces light off objects to detect them.

Technically, LIDAR is a depth perception method which transmits a light source to do either ranging or create multidimensional depth maps of the scene of interest. A LIDAR system is at its high performance when the components are included within small and efficient power management, integration of subsystems, inexpensive high-speed data processing, and sophisticated software to make sense of all the data. 

The major application lies in ranging or creating accurate multi-dimensional depth maps, or representations of a particular area, or an environment. The shorter wavelength emitted from LIDAR form a much higher resolution image due to some physical limitations.

How LIDAR differs from a Radar System and what does it do?

Ever wondered what impact a much shorter wavelength can create which is not possible with radar? A shorter wavelength enables a much higher resolution image, due to a physical limitation---which is that a measurement cannot be more precise than what is used to measure it. Even with modulations in software and signal processing, one can characterize something so precise only with longer wavelengths. On the contrary, with LIDAR’s shorter wavelengths one can scan the entire environment for objects and their features instead of being limited to only knowing location, size or velocity.

Use of LIDAR in consumer and business applications

In today’s ever-developing Industry 4.0 LIDAR technology products are being used by several industries such as Automotive, Aerospace and Defense, Security & Surveillance amongst others. In India, there is a significant increase in the adoption of LIDAR technology by almost every industry such as: 

Animated Movies/Video Games: Film Makers use LIDAR technology to capture the real-time motions of actors in 3D and replicate the same in a fictional universe to establish a more seamless interaction between reality and realities generated by the software.

Geographical Survey: LIDAR allows geographical researchers to uncover ancient substances that would not be feasible to investigate using other technology. Further, it helps in accessing disaster assessment, early warning systems, emergency response, and location-based investigations by creating accurate shoreline maps and digital elevation models.

For example, in 2021, the Government of India initiated a survey project to create 3-D images (using LIDAR) of forest areas in Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Nagaland, and Tripura to recommend soil and water conservation structures.

Robotics: Currently, LIDAR is been used to equip robots with mapping and navigation capabilities. For example, in auto-driving vehicles (automobile, aerospace and defence), LIDAR is used to train an autonomous system to recognize the distance between the vehicle and other objects in the environment, to avoid a collision, blind side detection, emergency braking, adaptive cruise control, dynamic suspension control, and parking assist. Other such examples could be the robotic home cleaning devices equipped with LIDAR, enabling devices to navigate dirt precisely, detect obstacles and reroute to avoid collisions.

Security & Surveillance: Cameras or sensors inbuilt with LIDAR technology enable more effective surveillance at a lower cost, and with less human intervention. It allows sensors to detect objects easily and respond more keenly when a person-like object enters.

Agriculture: In agriculture, LIDAR helps in capturing crop growth in granular detail over time provides important data, and informs on cultivation practices, both in real-time and for future crops. Further, it helps optimize the movement of automated machinery in harvesting crops.

LIDAR: A future-oriented technology with boundless opportunities

With technology like LIDAR, the era of a fully autonomous world no longer seems a distant dream. LIDAR is one of the most important technologies which helps to shift to autonomous applications. 

Depth sensors such as radio detection and ranging (radar), stereo vision, ultrasonic detection and ranging have a unique trade-off between performance, form factor, and cost. LIDAR system design helps bridge these gaps with precision depth sensing, fine angular resolution, and low complexity processing, even at longer ranges. 

At a time, when the world is moving towards autonomy, we will see more such use cases of LIDAR adoption in different applications. Without a doubt, it is a technology of the future which will be utilized by industries as per their evolving requirements and new innovations.

The article has been written by Praveen Jose, Field Application Manager (FAM), Analog Devices Inc.