Atmospheric simulator for testing adaptive optics systems

Christopher C. Wilcox; Ty Martinez; Freddie Santiago; Jonathan R. Andrews; Sergio R Restaino; Scott W. Teare; Don Payne

doi:10.1117/12.795584

26 August 2008 Atmospheric simulator for testing adaptive optics systems

Christopher C. Wilcox, Ty Martinez, Freddie Santiago, Jonathan R. Andrews, Sergio R Restaino, Scott W. Teare, Don Payne

Proceedings Volume 7093, Advanced Wavefront Control: Methods, Devices, and Applications VI; 709305 (2008) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.795584
Event: Optical Engineering + Applications, 2008, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) has been conducting research in novel portable adaptive optics systems for many years. These systems are tested exhaustively in a laboratory environment before being migrated to field experiments on astronomical telescopes. As part of the laboratory testing, an atmosphere simulator hardware testbed has been developed to provide a realization of atmospheric turbulence based on Kolmogorov statistics. In this testbed, a high-pixel count liquid crystal spatial light modulator induces the atmospheric turbulence through a series of computer calculated phase maps. User controls allow a wide range of telescope apertures and seeing conditions to be explored for testing the adaptive optics system. This paper explains and reports on the use of this dynamic and expandable system in characterizing the performance and optimization parameters of the adaptive optics systems at NRL.

Citation Download Citation

Christopher C. Wilcox, Ty Martinez, Freddie Santiago, Jonathan R. Andrews, Sergio R Restaino, Scott W. Teare, and Don Payne "Atmospheric simulator for testing adaptive optics systems", Proc. SPIE 7093, Advanced Wavefront Control: Methods, Devices, and Applications VI, 709305 (26 August 2008); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.795584

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