Progress toward developing the TMT adaptive optical systems and their components

Brent Ellerbroek; Sean Adkins; David Andersen; Jenny Atwood; Corinne Boyer; Peter Byrnes; Rodolphe Conan; Luc Gilles; Glen Herriot; Paul Hickson; Ed Hileman; Dick Joyce; Brian Leckie; Ming Liang; Thomas Pfrommer; Jean-Christophe Sinquin; Jean-Pierre Veran; Lianqi Wang; Paul Welle

doi:10.1117/12.788057

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7 July 2008 Progress toward developing the TMT adaptive optical systems and their components

Brent Ellerbroek, Sean Adkins, David Andersen, Jenny Atwood, Corinne Boyer, Peter Byrnes, Rodolphe Conan, Luc Gilles, Glen Herriot, Paul Hickson, Ed Hileman, Dick Joyce, Brian Leckie, Ming Liang, Thomas Pfrommer, Jean-Christophe Sinquin, Jean-Pierre Veran, Lianqi Wang, Paul Welle

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Proceedings Volume 7015, Adaptive Optics Systems; 70150R (2008) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.788057
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2008, Marseille, France

Abstract

Atmospheric turbulence compensation via adaptive optics (AO) will be essential for achieving most objectives of the TMT science case. The performance requirements for the initial implementation of the observatory's facility AO system include diffraction-limited performance in the near IR with 50 per cent sky coverage at the galactic pole. This capability will be achieved via an order 60x60 multi-conjugate AO system (NFIRAOS) with two deformable mirrors optically conjugate to ranges of 0 and 12 km, six high-order wavefront sensors observing laser guide stars in the mesospheric sodium layer, and up to three low-order, IR, natural guide star wavefront sensors located within each client instrument. The associated laser guide star facility (LGSF) will consist of 3 50W class, solid state, sum frequency lasers, conventional beam transport optics, and a launch telescope located behind the TMT secondary mirror. In this paper, we report on the progress made in designing, modeling, and validating these systems and their components over the last two years. This includes work on the overall layout and detailed opto-mechanical designs of NFIRAOS and the LGSF; reliable wavefront sensing methods for use with elongated and time-varying sodium laser guide stars; developing and validating a robust tip/tilt control architecture and its components; computationally efficient algorithms for very high order wavefront control; detailed AO system modeling and performance optimization incorporating all of these effects; and a range of supporting lab/field tests and component prototyping activities at TMT partners. Further details may be found in the additional papers on each of the above topics.

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Brent Ellerbroek, Sean Adkins, David Andersen, Jenny Atwood, Corinne Boyer, Peter Byrnes, Rodolphe Conan, Luc Gilles, Glen Herriot, Paul Hickson, Ed Hileman, Dick Joyce, Brian Leckie, Ming Liang, Thomas Pfrommer, Jean-Christophe Sinquin, Jean-Pierre Veran, Lianqi Wang, and Paul Welle "Progress toward developing the TMT adaptive optical systems and their components", Proc. SPIE 7015, Adaptive Optics Systems, 70150R (7 July 2008); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.788057

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