Adaptive secondary for the 2.1-m telescope at SPM Observatory

Arturo I. Iriarte Valverde; Salvador Cuevas; J. Elon Graves; Malcolm J. Northcott

doi:10.1117/12.390286

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7 July 2000 Adaptive secondary for the 2.1-m telescope at SPM Observatory

Arturo I. Iriarte Valverde, Salvador Cuevas, J. Elon Graves, Malcolm J. Northcott

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Proceedings Volume 4007, Adaptive Optical Systems Technology; (2000) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.390286
Event: Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation, 2000, Munich, Germany

Abstract

Atmospheric turbulence distorts the wavefront of the incoming light from an astronomical object and so limits the ability of a telescope to form a perfect image. The AO systems for astronomy had come the most powerful tool for infrared observation in the near thermal domain. A conventional AO system requires quite a few reflections that are needed to transfer and correct an image. A typical system would have a collimator, deformable mirror and a camera at the bare minimum. For the thermal region the gains are substantial where one can eliminate extra optical surfaces and their associated thermal background, that occurs when you put the deformable mirror at the secondary. We study the possibility of development an adaptive secondary with the techniques of a Current Bimorph mirror with the necessaries number of actuators for control the edge slope. Also we simulate the performance of a 19 channels curvature adaptive optics system in order to demonstrate the gain achievable with an adaptive secondary. The adaptive secondary for the 2.1 m Telescope at SPM Observatory is designed for a f/50 beam, 100 mm in diameter with 19 actuators necessaries to control the edge slope and curvature.

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Arturo I. Iriarte Valverde, Salvador Cuevas, J. Elon Graves, and Malcolm J. Northcott "Adaptive secondary for the 2.1-m telescope at SPM Observatory", Proc. SPIE 4007, Adaptive Optical Systems Technology, (7 July 2000); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.390286

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