📋 Tender Overview
The ENLIGHTEN project aims to develop disruptive technologies for next-generation electro-optical (EO) sensing devices which enable vision of scenes hidden behind obstacles. With this future sensing approach, ENLIGHTEN pushes the development of advanced concepts, promising technologies and innovations to the benefit of operational effectiveness. Moreover, the project supports the EU strategic autonomy and its freedom of action. Further, the project aims at stimulating cross-border cooperation of legal entities and fostering a better exploitation of the industrial potential of innovation, research and technological development. ENLIGHTEN can significantly boost the performance of future capabilities. ENLIGHTEN overcomes the current limitations to the line-of-sight of EO imaging by providing the capability to sense around obstacles onto scenes hidden from direct view. This non-line-of-sight (NLOS) technology is a game-changing capability, with the potential to improve the competitiveness, endurance and survivability in different operational scenarios. ENLIGHTEN improves NLOS technology from a laboratory demonstration level to relevant demonstration in terms of accessibility of building block technologies (sensor, laser source), data processing (algorithms) and demonstration setup. The main technical challenge of this project is to develop new NLOS algorithms and technology such as a SPAD camera and laser illuminator that work in the short-wave-infrared (SWIR) regime. By transferring the technology to operate in the SWIR regime, we will make it eye-safe, stealthy, and less affected by weather conditions, thus lifting many of the current limitations of current VIS approaches. Further, application of a SPAD array will reduce data acquisition time and therefore enables application in military relevant dynamic scenarios. We intend to bring the current technology readiness level (TRL) of 2/3 to TRL 5.
