New Ways to Look through Nanopores

In this thesis, we have introduced palladium zero-mode waveguides (Pd ZMWs) as a valuable tool for biophysics research and have showcased several applications thereof. We started by using them as single-molecule sensors for free translocations of fluorophores, proteins, and voltage-driven translocations of DNA. By studying salt-gradient driven...

Efficient Earthquake Inversion using the Finite Element Method

A vital component in the management of seismic hazard is the study of past seismic events. Classically, this has been the domain of seismology, which studies the dynamic manifestations of the event to infer properties such as epicenter and moment magnitude. More recently it has become possible to perform similar analyses on the basis of the...

Forward-Looking Ultra-Wideband Synthetic Array Imaging

The expansion of microwave imaging applications in various fields proposes increasingly higher requirements (including spatial resolution, dynamic range, and signal-to-noise ratio) for microwave imaging systems. To achieve high-quality imaging, microwave imaging systems generally exploit spatial-, frequency- and polarization-diversities to probe...

Burial-related fracturing in sub-horizontal and folded reservoirs: Geometry, geomechanics and impact on permeability

Surface and subsurface water from space: On the integration of microwave remote sensing observations with flood prediction systems

The technique of active microwave remote sensing has made much progress toward its high potential to monitor water storage changes in terrestrial surface and subsurface water bodies at various spatial and temporal scales. The number of studies demonstrating the support these data can offer in hydrological and hydraulic model building, model...

Vectorial diffraction of extreme ultraviolet light and ultrashort light pulses

In this thesis, we present applications in optics involving the diffraction theory of light for two advanced technologies. We have used a rigorous vectorial diffraction method to model: (i) the imaging of mask structures in extreme ultraviolet lithography, and (ii) ultrashort pulse propagation through small apertures. We have explained the...

An analytic approach to electromagnetic scattering problems

Adaptive motion compensation in sonar array processing

In recent years, sonar performance has mainly improved via a significant increase in array ap-erture, signal bandwidth and computational power. This thesis aims at improving sonar array processing techniques based on these three steps forward. In applications such as anti-submarine warfare and mine hunting motion of the sonar needs to be...

Optical aperture synthesis: A comparison of techniques for wide-field interferometric imaging

The research described in this thesis provides onsets for research in several areas of interest related to aperture synthesis and guidelines concerning the design of synthetic telescopes for imaging. As such, this research contributes to the improvement of instrumentation for observational astronomy, in particular for stellar interferometry....

Shared aperture array antennas composed of differently sized

A novel solution for conceiving wide band (multi-band) array antennas is presented. The solution is based on the concept of interleaving sparse, sub-arrays operating at separate frequencies. Sparse array antennas offer two major advantages, namely: they have non-uniformly distributed elements, with possibly large distances between elements (this...

Development of an Airborne Ka-band FMCW Synthetic Aperture Radar

In the field of airborne earth observation there is a special interest in lightweight, low cost imaging radars of high resolution. Such radar systems could play an essential role in small-scale earth observation applications such as the monitoring of dikes, watercourses or areas in which gas pipes or electrical power lines are buried. In order...

Architectures for Real-Time On-Board Synthetic Aperture Radar Processing

Characterization of Miniature Dielectric-filled Open-ended Waveguide Antennas