Compensation efficiencies of conventional tracking and higher-order beam control in extended turbulence

Matthew R. Whiteley

doi:10.1117/12.409302

17 November 2000 Compensation efficiencies of conventional tracking and higher-order beam control in extended turbulence

Matthew R. Whiteley

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 4125, Propagation and Imaging through the Atmosphere IV; (2000) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.409302
Event: International Symposium on Optical Science and Technology, 2000, San Diego, CA, United States

Abstract

Conventional beam control techniques are often divided into two categories. Tracking control addresses the stabilization of the beam on a target, whereas higher-order control addresses the broadening of the beam due to atmospheric aberrations. For scenarios where strong turbulence is distributed throughout the entire propagation path, the effectiveness of conventional beam control techniques is greatly reduced over less-stressing scenarios. In this case, the effect on objective measures of beam compensation performance is not equally distributed between tracking and higher-order control. In this study, we have developed an analytic framework in which to quantify the efficiency of each type of control with respect to standard compensation performance metrics. This analysis highlights that the performance of each type of control must be assessed relative to the other. Using wave-optics simulation along with out analytic framework, we quantify the efficiency of a centroid tracker and an adaptive optics system using standard least-squares reconstruction with a point-source beacon for atmospheric Rytov parameter values of 0.1 < R < 1.0. We find that R<0.4, both tracking and higher-order control contribute equally to the observed performance degradation. For R>0.5, however, conventional higher-order control is the principal source of compensation performance degradation.

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Matthew R. Whiteley "Compensation efficiencies of conventional tracking and higher-order beam control in extended turbulence", Proc. SPIE 4125, Propagation and Imaging through the Atmosphere IV, (17 November 2000); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.409302

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