Wide-field speckle techniques for small, urban telescopes.
Abstract
Recent work with the NESSI speckle camera at Kitt Peak and the 'Alopeke speckle camera at Gemini-North indicates that reduction techniques borrowed from speckle imaging can be successfully modified to produce high-resolution images over fields that are at least tens of arc seconds across. While these ``wide-field'' speckle image reconstructions are not diffraction-limited, the improvement in resolution over the seeing-limited case can be substantial. These techniques were applied to images taken with a small (0.6-m) telescope at Southern Connecticut State University, where seeing conditions are generally much worse than at large, mountaintop observatories, and where poor telescope tracking and collimation are factors in image quality. By using the wide field speckle techniques presented here, we show that the campus telescope can give much improved image quality in this urban, sea-level setting with relatively little additional cost. We present data using our initial set-up and discuss the potential for this approach for improving the imaging capabilities of small telescopes on our campus and beyond.
- Publication:
-
American Astronomical Society Meeting Abstracts #233
- Pub Date:
- January 2019
- Bibcode:
- 2019AAS...23343704G