Related papers: Detailed Design of a Deployable Tertiary Mirror fo…
Lens time delays are a powerful probe of cosmology, provided that the gravitational potential of the main deflector can be modeled with sufficient precision. Recent work has shown that this can be achieved by detailed modeling of the host…
Liger is an adaptive optics (AO) fed imager and integral field spectrograph (IFS) designed to take advantage of the Keck All-sky Precision Adaptive-optics (KAPA) upgrade for the W.M. Keck Observatory. We present the design and analysis of…
Active optics techniques in astronomy provide high imaging quality. This paper is dedicated to highly deformable active optics that can generate non-axisymmetric aspheric surfaces-or freeform surfaces-by use of a minimum number of…
The Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) is a planned observatory for very-high energy gamma-ray astronomy. It will consist of several tens of telescopes of different sizes, with a total mirror area of up to 10,000 square meters. Most mirrors of…
Deformable mirrors with very high order correction generally have smaller dynamic range of motion than what is required to correct seeing over large aperture telescopes. As a result, systems will need to have an architecture that employs…
The Astro2010 Decadal Survey recommended a Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST) as its top priority for a new large space mission. As conceived by the decadal survey, WFIRST would carry out a dark energy science program, a…
The latest high-performance telescopes for deep space observation employ very large primary mirrors that are made of smaller segments, like the JWST which employs monolithic beryllium hexagonal segments. A very promising development stage…
We investigate whether a three-mirror system, having secondary and the tertiary mirrors with surfaces warped by Zernike polynomials generated by active vase mirrors, is suitable to do the corrections of a fixed parabolic mirror observing at…
We present the first on-sky segmented primary mirror closed-loop piston control using a Zernike wavefront sensor (ZWFS) installed on the Keck II telescope. Segment co-phasing errors are a primary contributor to contrast limits on Keck and…
Liger is a second generation near-infrared imager and integral field spectrograph (IFS) for the W. M. Keck Observatory that will utilize the capabilities of the Keck All-sky Precision Adaptive-optics (KAPA) system. Liger operates at a…
DEEP is a two-phase spectral survey of faint field galaxies with the Keck Telescopes. The goals include exploring galaxy formation and evolution, mapping distant large scale structures, and constraining cosmology. DEEP, since its inception…
Liger is an adaptive optics (AO) fed imager and integral field spectrograph (IFS) designed to take advantage of the Keck All-sky Precision Adaptive-optics (KAPA) upgrade to the Keck I telescope. Liger adapts the design of the InfraRed…
We describe a technology for the fabrication of inexpensive and versatile mirrors through the use of a new type of nanoengineered optical material composed by the spreading of a self-assembling reflective colloidal film spread at the…
There are scientific and technological needs to improve the co-phasing of the primary mirrors of segmented telescopes. We have developed a methodology for using the wavefront sensor of an adaptive optics (AO) system to disentangle the phase…
Exoplanet direct imaging allows us to directly probe and characterize an exoplanet's atmosphere, searching for signs of life in its atmospheric signatures. Directly imaging an Earth-like planet around a Sun-like star requires reaching…
Low-surface-brightness (LSB) structures play a crucial role in understanding galaxy evolution by providing significant insights into galaxy interactions, the histories of mass assembly, and the distribution of dark matter. Nevertheless,…
Additive manufacturing (AM; 3D printing) has clear benefits in the production of lightweight mirrors for astronomy: it can create optimised lightweight structures and combine multiple components into one. New capabilities in AM ceramics,…
The Deformable Mirror Simulator (DMS) is an optical device reproducing the F/13 beam from the adaptive secondary mirror of the Very Large Telescope UT4. The system has been designed and integrated as a test tool for the calibration and…
High throughput optical system is defined to possess the features of both large field of view (FOV) and high resolution. However, it is full of challenge to design such a telescope with the two conflicting specifications at the same time.…
I argue that there is a crisis in optical Astronomy due to a paucity of telescopes and thus the need for a paradigm shift in telescope technology. Large increases in collecting areas and observing time/astronomer are only possible if we…