Proceedings Article | 22 July 2016
Gabby Aitink-Kroes, Tibor Agócs, Chris Miller, Martin Black, Szigfrid Farkas, Sabri Lemared, Felix Bettonvil, David Montgomery, Michel Marcos, Attila Jaskó, Farian van Duffelen, Zalpha Challita, Sandy Fok, Fatemeh Kiaeerad, Emmanuel Hugot, Hermine Schnetler, Lars Venema
Proc. SPIE. 9912, Advances in Optical and Mechanical Technologies for Telescopes and Instrumentation II
KEYWORDS: Actuators, Diffraction, Mirrors, Optical design, Metrology, Imaging systems, Control systems, Freeform optics, Disk lasers, Disk lasers, Optics manufacturing
FAME is a four-year project and part of the OPTICON/FP7 program that is aimed at providing a breakthrough component for future compact, wide field, high resolution imagers or spectrographs, based on both Freeform technology, and the flexibility and versatility of active systems. <p> </p>Due to the opening of a new parameter space in optical design, Freeform Optics are a revolution in imaging systems for a broad range of applications from high tech cameras to astronomy, via earth observation systems, drones and defense. Freeform mirrors are defined by a non-rotational symmetry of the surface shape, and the fact that the surface shape cannot be simply described by conicoids extensions, or off-axis conicoids. An extreme freeform surface is a significantly challenging optical surface, especially for UV/VIS/NIR diffraction limited instruments.<p> </p> The aim of the FAME effort is to use an extreme freeform mirror with standard optics in order to propose an integrated system solution for use in future instruments. The work done so far concentrated on identification of compact, fast, widefield optical designs working in the visible, with diffraction limited performance; optimization of the number of required actuators and their layout; the design of an active array to manipulate the face sheet, as well as the actuator design. <p> </p>In this paper we present the status of the demonstrator development, with focus on the different building blocks: an extreme freeform thin face sheet, the active array, a highly controllable thermal actuator array, and the metrology and control system.
