Design of the Dual Conjugate Adaptive Optics Test-bed
Abstract
In this paper, we describe the Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics laboratory test-bed presently under construction at the University of Victoria, Canada. The test-bench will be used to support research in the performance of multi-conjugate adaptive optics, turbulence simulators, laser guide stars and miniaturizing adaptive optics. The main components of the test-bed include two micro-machined deformable mirrors, a tip-tilt mirror, four wavefront sensors, a source simulator, a dual-layer turbulence simulator, as well as computational and control hardware. The paper will describe in detail the opto-mechanical design of the adaptive optics module, the design of the hot-air turbulence generator and the configuration chosen for the source simulator. Below, we present a summary of these aspects of the bench. The optical and mechanical design of the test-bed has been largely driven by the particular choice of the deformable mirrors. These are continuous micro-machined mirrors manufactured by Boston Micromachines Corporation. They have a clear aperture of 3.3 mm and are deformed with 140 actuators arranged in a square grid. Although the mirrors have an open-loop bandwidth of 6.6 KHz, their shape can be updated at a sampling rate of 100 Hz. In our optical design, the mirrors are conjugated at 0km and 10 km in the atmosphere. A planar optical layout was achieved by using four off-axis paraboloids and several folding mirrors. These optics will be mounted on two solid blocks which can be aligned with respect to each other. The wavefront path design accommodates 3 monochromatic guide stars that can be placed at either 90 km or at infinity. The design relies on the natural separation of the beam into 3 parts because of differences in locations of the guide stars in the field of view. In total four wavefront sensors will be procured from Adaptive Optics Associates (AOA) or built in-house: three for the guide stars and the fourth to collect data from the science source output in order to quantify the quality of the correction achieved with the DM's. A mini-wavescope, also supplied by AOA, will be part of the test-bed and is intended for use as an auxilliary tool for system calibration and identification. The foreoptics of the complete layout emulates a 32 cm, F/40 telescope, which itself was scaled down from an 8 meter telescope, while maintaining a 2' field of view. The foreoptics entrance beam diameter is 30 mm. The tip-tilt mirror procured from Ball Aerospace is placed at 0km in the foreoptics, before the deformable mirrors. A turbulence generator and a source simulator must be constructed for the test-bed since it is intended for use as a stand-alone research facility. Several concepts were considered for the turbulence generator: a holographic simulator, a spatial light modulator based on liquid-crystal technology, a phase plate based simulator and the hot-air turbulence generator. The latter was identified as the most suitable concept for our facility, after comparing the versatility, capabilities, and cost of the alternatives. The proposed design follows closely that developed by [Jolissaint, 2000] and aims to produce turbulence with Cn2 delta h ~ O (10-10) and D/r0 of approximately 8. With an appropriately designed fold of the beam, a single hot-air turbulator can be used to provide both turbulence layers for the beam. The source simulator will accommodate three guide stars with a fixed triangular geometry and a white science source that can be placed at an arbitrary location in the field of view. The guide stars can be located either at infinity to emulate NGS, or at 90 km to emulate sodium backscatter produced with lasers in a real adaptive optics system. Since the GS are held fixed above the turbulence, they can also be used to derive tip-tilt information, thus obviating the need for Natural Guide Stars. The dual-layer adaptive optics test-bed presented in this poster is expected to be fully operational by the middle of 2002. Parts of it will become available for testing throught the next year. The initial experiments to be conducted with the test-bed will include testing the response and performance of the deformable mirror, characterizing the hot-air turbulator and closing the loop on a single DM with the mini-wavescope. The poster will also describe longer-term research projects envisioned for the facility.
- Publication:
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European Southern Observatory Conference and Workshop Proceedings
- Pub Date:
- 2002
- Bibcode:
- 2002ESOC...58..383S