Aggregate behavior of branch points: characterization in wave optical simulation

Denis W. Oesch; Carolyn M. Tewksbury-Christle; Darryl J. Sanchez; Patrick R. Kelly

doi:10.1117/1.OE.51.10.106001

17 October 2012 Aggregate behavior of branch points: characterization in wave optical simulation

Denis W. Oesch, Carolyn M. Tewksbury-Christle, Darryl J. Sanchez, Patrick R. Kelly

Author Affiliations +

Optical Engineering, Vol. 51, Issue 10, 106001 (October 2012). https://doi.org/10.1117/1.OE.51.10.106001

Abstract

Atmospheric turbulence imparts phase distortions on propagating optical waves. These distortions couple into amplitude fluctuations at the pupil of a telescope, which, for strong enough phase distortions, produce zeros in the amplitude called branch points. In our earlier work, we presented the case that branch points can be utilized as a source of information on the turbulent atmosphere. Using our bench-top data, we have demonstrated several properties of branch points including motion, density, persistence and separation. We have shown that the pupil plane motion of subsets of branch points scales to the velocities of atmospheric turbulence layers and identifies the number of branch point producing layers. We have identified empirical relationships for density and separation as functions of the strength and altitude for a single layer. All of this work has been done using a bench-top adaptive optics system utilizing a two-layer atmospheric turbulence simulator. In this paper, we use simulations to verify these previous results by showing that all of these branch point properties follow similar behaviors in independently anchored wave optics simulations.

Citation Download Citation

Denis W. Oesch, Carolyn M. Tewksbury-Christle, Darryl J. Sanchez, and Patrick R. Kelly "Aggregate behavior of branch points: characterization in wave optical simulation," Optical Engineering 51(10), 106001 (17 October 2012). https://doi.org/10.1117/1.OE.51.10.106001

Published: 17 October 2012

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available