Related papers: Low Order Adaptive Optics with Very Faint Referenc…
The optimal performance of adaptive optics systems can only be maintained if the wavefront reference is bright and compact. Experience has shown that both of these important criteria are remarkably difficult to achieve with laser guide…
One important frontier for astronomical adaptive optics (AO) involves methods such as Multi-Object AO and Multi-Conjugate AO that have the potential to give a significantly larger field of view than conventional AO techniques. A second key…
As new large-scale astronomical surveys greatly increase the number of objects targeted and discoveries made, the requirement for efficient follow-up observations is crucial. Adaptive optics imaging, which compensates for the image-blurring…
The use of laser guide stars in astronomical adaptive optics results in elongated Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor image patterns. Image correlation techniques can be used to determine local wavefront slope by correlating each sub-aperture…
Increasing interest in astronomical applications of non-linear curvature wavefront sensors for turbulence detection and correction makes it important to understand how best to handle the data they produce, particularly at low light levels.…
Adaptive optics is a strategy to compensate for sample-induced aberrations in microscopy applications. Generally, it requires the presence of "guide stars" in the sample to serve as localized reference targets. We describe an implementation…
In this paper we present the Adaptive Optics Lucky Imager (AOLI), a state-of-the-art instrument which makes use of two well proved techniques for extremely high spatial resolution with ground-based telescopes: Lucky Imaging (LI) and…
Optical interferometry has been successful at achieving milliarcsecond resolution on bright stars. Imaging performance can improve greatly by increasing the number of baselines, which has motivated proposals to build large (~ 100 m) optical…
Astronomical adaptive optics systems are used to increase effective telescope resolution. However, they cannot be used to observe the whole sky since one or more natural guide stars of sufficient brightness must be found within the…
We propose a complete framework for the detection, astrometry, and photometry of faint companions from a sequence of adaptive optics corrected short exposures. The algorithms exploit the difference in statistics between the on-axis and…
Direct imaging of exoplanets allows us to measure positions and chemical signatures of exoplanets. Given the limited resources for space observations where the atmosphere is absent, we want to make these measurements from the ground.…
Observational tests of ground layer wavefront recovery have been made in open loop using a constellation of four natural guide stars at the 1.55 m Kuiper telescope in Arizona. Such tests explore the effectiveness of wide-field seeing…
The performance of adaptive optics systems is partially dependant on the algorithms used within the real-time control system to compute wavefront slope measurements. We demonstrate use of a matched filter algorithm for the processing of…
We investigate methods to calibrate the non-common path aberrations at an adaptive optics system having a wavefront-correcting device working at an extremely high resolution (larger than 150x150). We use focal-plane images collected…
Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensors for both solar and laser guide star adaptive optics (with elongated spots) need to observe extended objects. Correlation techniques have been successfully employed to measure the wavefront gradient in solar…
Laser guide stars created by Rayleigh scattering provide a reasonable means to monitor atmospheric wavefront distortions for real-time correction by adaptive optics systems. Because of the $\lambda^{-4}$ wavelength dependence of Rayleigh…
Most current astronomical adaptive optics (AO) systems rely on the availability of a bright star to measure the distortion of the incoming wavefront. Replacing the guide star with an artificial laser beacon alleviates this dependency on…
Future large space telescopes will be equipped with adaptive optics (AO) to overcome wavefront aberrations and achieve high contrast for imaging faint astronomical objects, such as earth-like exoplanets and debris disks. In contrast to AO…
We present near-IR images of five luminous quasars at z~2 and one at z~4 obtained with an experimental adaptive optics instrument at the ESO Very Large Telescope. The observations are part of a program aimed at demonstrating the…
The major cornerstone of future ground-based astronomy is imaging and spectroscopy at the diffraction limit using adaptive optics. To exploit the potential of current AO systems, we have begun a survey around bright stars to study…