Limits to the accuracy of lidar measurements of hydrooptical parameters

The specific manifestation of the amplification of backscattering due to surface waves, caused by angular misorientation of the optic axes of the lidar transmitter and detector, was investigated theoretically and in model experiments. This effect limits the accuracy of the internal reference method with normalization to the spontaneous Raman scattering signal, widely used in lidar experiments. Measurement errors may also arise as a result of nonlinear optical interactions caused by random focusing of the probe beam by surface waves.