Atmospheric turbulence sensing for a multiconjugate adaptive optics system

Dustin C. Johnston; Byron M. Welsh

doi:10.1117/12.48795

1 December 1991 Atmospheric turbulence sensing for a multiconjugate adaptive optics system

Dustin C. Johnston, Byron M. Welsh

Proceedings Volume 1542, Active and Adaptive Optical Systems; (1991) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.48795
Event: San Diego, '91, 1991, San Diego, CA, United States

Abstract

Current adaptive optical telescope designs use a single deformable mirror (DM), usually conjugated to the aperture plane, to compensate for the cumulative effects of optical turbulence. The corrected field of view of an adaptive optics system could theoretically be increased through the use of multiple DMs conjugated to a number of corresponding planes which sample the turbulence region in altitude. Control of each DM is via a method for determining the phase distortion contributed by atmospheric layers at the selected altitudes. A theoretical analysis for determining these phase contributions takes advantage of the spatial diversity of wavefront sensor measurements from two or more reference sources. These separate wavefront sensor measurements are processed via minimum mean square error filtering to yield an estimate of the phase perturbation caused by a particular turbulent layer of the atmosphere. Our initial investigation indicates that multiple wavefront corrector adaptive optics systems will require much brighter reference sources than single wavefront corrector systems.

Citation Download Citation

Dustin C. Johnston and Byron M. Welsh "Atmospheric turbulence sensing for a multiconjugate adaptive optics system", Proc. SPIE 1542, Active and Adaptive Optical Systems, (1 December 1991); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.48795

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