MORFEO: Advancing Towards Final Design
Abstract
The Multiconjugate adaptive Optics Relay For ELT Observations (MORFEO) is a first-generation adaptive optics module for the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), designed to deliver a diffraction-limited, highly uniform 53x53 arcsec field of view to the MICADO near-infrared camera. As the project advances toward its Final Design Review (FDR), significant consolidations have been achieved across all subsystems. This paper presents an updated overview of the MORFEO system, highlighting its dual operational modes (MCAO and SCAO) and recent developments in its opto-mechanical architecture. We dedicate specific focus to the core adaptive hardware, detailing the fifth-generation post-focal deformable mirrors, the highly complex Laser Guide Star (LGS) objective zoom system required to track sodium layer variations, and the Natural Guide Star (NGS) low-order and reference sensing strategies. Furthermore, we detail the advanced pseudo-open-loop control strategy managed by a split Hard and Soft Real-Time Computer architecture. Finally, we report the latest end-to-end performance estimations obtained via the SPECULA simulation framework, demonstrating compliance with the stringent Strehl Ratio and sky coverage requirements under median atmospheric conditions.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2607.13258,
title = {MORFEO: Advancing Towards Final Design},
author = {Lorenzo Busoni and Guido Agapito and Marco Bonaglia and Alfio Puglisi and Marco Xompero and Matteo Aliverti and Francesca Annibali and Carmelo Arcidiacono and Natalia Auricchio and Nicolò Azzaroli and Andrea Balestra and Alessandro Ballone and Louis Barbier and Andrea Baruffolo and Federico Battaini and Maria Bergomi and Andrea Bianco and Michele Cantiello and Giulio Capasso and Giulia Carlà and Enrico Cascone and Ed Chapin and Manal Chebbo and Simonetta Chinellato and Vincenzo Cianniello and Paolo Ciliegi and Mirko Colapietro and Jean-Jacques Correia and Giuseppe Cosentino and Elia Costa and Matteo D'ambrogio and Vincenzo De Caprio and Giuseppe De Luca and Nicholas Devaney and Ivan Di Antonio and Amico Di Cianno and Simone Di Filippo and Benedetta Di Francesco and Ugo Di Giammatteo and Chiara Di Prospero and Gianluca Di Rico and Andrea Di Rocco and Daphne Diretto and Christian Eredia and Simone Esposito and Jacopo Farinato and Italo Foppiani and Takashi Funakawa and Fulvio Gianotti and Laurence Gluck and Davide Greggio and Sylvain Guieu and Marco Gullieuszik and Yuuichi Harikane and Masahiro Ikoma and Laurent Jocou and Dan Kerley and Mikio Kurita and Salvatore Lampitelli and Tommaso Lapucci and Fulvio Laudisio and Yves Magnard and Demetrio Magrin and Hossein Mahmoodzadeh and Dheeraj Malik and Luca Marafatto and Laurence Michaud and Christophe Michel and Satoshi Miyazaki and Kentaro Motohara and David Mouillet and Thibaut Moulin and Matteo Munari and Kentaro Nagamine and Sylvain Oberti and Fabrice Pancher and Giorgio Pariani and Sophie Penger and Amedeo Petrella and Laurent Pinard and Cédric Plantet and Elisa Portaluri and Kalyan Radhakrishnan and Roberto Ragazzoni and Edoardo Redaelli and Edgar Renault and Colin Richardson and Marco Riva and Sylvain Rochat and Gabriele Rodeghiero and Luca Rosignoli and Bernardo Salasnich and Benoit Sassolas and Salvatore Savarese and Marcello Scalera and Pietro Schipani and Danilo Selvestrel and Mahshid Shiri and Mina Sibalic and Malcolm Smith and Sebastian Soler and Rosanna Sordo and Alessandro Tacchini and Alessio Taranto and Ludovico Teodori and Gabriele Umbriaco and Yoshinori Uzawa and Angelo Valentini and Jean-Pierre Véran},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2607.13258},
year = {2026}
}
Comments
11 pages, 9 figures, 2 tables. Submitted to Adaptive Optics for Extremely Large Telescopes 8, October 27 to 31, 2025 Viña del Mar, Chile