The impact of signal–noise ratio on degree of linear polarization measurement

The radiometric measurement is the basics of polarimetric measurement. This paper presents a simple approach for estimating the degree of linear polarization errors caused by the radiometric measurement uncertainty. According to the measurement principle of polarization CCD camera, we deduce the relation of the degree of linear polarization error to the signal–noise ratio and the polarization state (polarization angle or degree of linear polarization) of the incident light. It clearly shows that polarimetric accuracy of polarization CCD camera could deteriorate due to the low signal–noise ratio; The degree of linear polarization error has also been influenced by the polarization state of the incident light except the signal–noise ratio, and the large degree of linear polarization of the incident beams often contribute to the bigger measured degree of linear polarization errors for a fixed signal–noise ratio.