John Pazder

The MOST Asteroseismology Mission: Ultraprecise Photometry from Space

ABSTRACT The Microvariablity and Oscillations of Stars (MOST) mission is a low‐cost microsatellite designed to detect low‐degree acoustic oscillations (periods of minutes) with micromagnitude precision in solar‐type stars and metal‐poor subdwarfs. There are also plans to detect light reflected from giant, short‐period, extrasolar planets and the oscillations of roAp stars and the turbulent variability in the dense winds of Wolf‐Rayet stars. This paper describes the experiment and how we met the challenge of ultraprecise photometry despite severe constraints on the mass, volume, and power available for the instrument. A side‐viewing, 150 mm aperture Rumak‐Maksutov telescope feeds two frame‐transfer CCDs, one for tracking and the other for science. There is a single 300 nm wide filter centered at 525 nm. Microlenses project Fabry images of the brighter ( documentclass{aastex} usepackage{amsbsy} usepackage{amsfonts} usepackage{amssymb} usepackage{bm} usepackage{mathrsfs} usepackage{pifont} usepackage...

The Gemini Planet Imager: integration and status

The Gemini Planet Imager is a next-generation instrument for the direct detection and characterization of young warm exoplanets, designed to be an order of magnitude more sensitive than existing facilities. It combines a 1700-actuator adaptive optics system, an apodized-pupil Lyot coronagraph, a precision interferometric infrared wavefront sensor, and a integral field spectrograph. All hardware and software subsystems are now complete and undergoing integration and test at UC Santa Cruz. We will present test results on each subsystem and the results of end-to-end testing. In laboratory testing, GPI has achieved a raw contrast (without post-processing) of 10-6 5σ at 0.4”, and with multiwavelength speckle suppression, 2x10-7 at the same separation.

NFIRAOS: first facility AO system for the Thirty Meter Telescope

NFIRAOS, the Thirty Meter Telescope’s first adaptive optics system is an order 60x60 Multi-Conjugate AO system with two deformable mirrors. Although most observing will use 6 laser guide stars, it also has an NGS-only mode. Uniquely, NFIRAOS is cooled to -30 °C to reduce thermal background. NFIRAOS delivers a 2-arcminute beam to three client instruments, and relies on up to three IR WFSs in each instrument. We present recent work including: robust automated acquisition on these IR WFSs; trade-off studies for a common-size of deformable mirror; real-time computing architectures; simplified designs for high-order NGS-mode wavefront sensing; modest upgrade concepts for high-contrast imaging.

First light adaptive optics systems and components for the Thirty Meter Telescope

Adaptive optics (AO) is essential for many elements of the science case for the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT). The initial requirements for the observatorys facility AO system include diffraction-limited performance in the near IR, with 50 per cent sky coverage at the galactic pole. Point spread function uniformity and stability over a 30 arc sec field-ofview are also required for precision photometry and astrometry. These capabilities will be achieved via an order 60×60 multi-conjugate AO system (NFIRAOS) with two deformable mirrors, six laser guide star wavefront sensors, and three low-order, IR, natural guide star wavefront sensors within each client instrument. The associated laser guide star facility (LGSF) will employ 150W of laser power at a wavelength of 589 nm to generate the six laser guide stars. We provide an update on the progress in designing, modeling, and validating these systems and their components over the last two years. This includes work on the layouts and detailed designs of NFIRAOS and the LGSF; fabrication and test of a full-scale prototype tip/tilt stage (TTS); Conceptual Designs Studies for the real time controller (RTC) hardware and algorithms; fabrication and test of the detectors for the laser- and natural-guide star wavefront sensors; AO system modeling and performance optimization; lab tests of wavefront sensing algorithms for use with elongated laser guide stars; and high resolution LIDAR measurements of the mesospheric sodium layer. Further details may be found in specific papers on each of these topics.

The Gemini planet imager: first light and commissioning

The Gemini Planet Imager (GPI) is a facility extreme-AO high-contrast instrument – optimized solely for study of faint companions – on the Gemini telescope. It combines a high-order MEMS AO system (1493 active actuators), an apodized pupil Lyot coronagraph, a high-accuracy IR post-coronagraph wavefront sensor, and a near-infrared integral field spectrograph. GPI incorporates several other novel features such as ultra-high quality optics, a spatially-filtered wavefront sensor, and new calibration techniques. GPI had first light in November 2013. This paper presnets results of first-light and performance verification and optimization and shows early science results including extrasolar planet spectra and polarimetric detection of the HR4696A disk. GPI is now achieving contrasts approaching 10-6 at 0.5” in 30 minute exposures.

SPIRou @ CFHT: spectrograph optical design

SPIRou is a near-infrared, echelle spectropolarimeter/velocimeter under design for the 3.6m Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) on Mauna Kea, Hawaii. The unique scientific capabilities and technical design features are described in the accompanying (eight) papers at this conference. In this paper we focus on the lens design of the optical spectrograph. The SPIROU spectrograph is a near infrared fiber fed double pass cross dispersed spectrograph. The cryogenic spectrograph is connected with the Cassegrain unit by the two science fibers. It is also fed by the fiber coming from the calibration box and RV reference module of the instrument. It includes 2 off-axis parabolas (1 in double pass), an echelle grating, a train of cross disperser prisms (in double pass), a flat folding mirror, a refractive camera and a detector. This paper describes the optical design of the spectrograph unit and estimates the performances. In particular, the echelle grating options are discussed as the goal grating is not available from the market.

TMT NFIRAOS: adaptive optics system for the Thirty Meter Telescope

NFIRAOS is the first-light adaptive optics system planned for the Thirty Meter Telescope, and is being designed at the National Research Council of Canadas Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics. NFIRAOS is a laser guide star multiconjugate adaptive optics system - a practical approach to providing diffraction limited image quality in the NIR over a 30 field of view, with high sky coverage. This will enable a wide range of TMT science that depends upon the large corrected field of view and high precision astrometry and photometry. We review recent progress developing the design and conducting performance estimates for NFIRAOS.

NFIRAOS: TMT's facility adaptive optics system

NFIRAOS, the TMT Observatorys initial facility AO system is a multi-conjugate AO system feeding science light from 0.8 to 2.5 microns wavelength to several near-IR client instruments. NFIRAOS has two deformable mirrors optically conjugated to 0 and 11.2 km, and will correct atmospheric turbulence with 50 per cent sky coverage at the galactic pole. An important requirement is to have very low background: the plan is to cool the optics; and one DM is on a tip/tilt stage to reduce surface count. NFIRAOS real time control uses multiple sodium laser wavefront sensors and up to three IR natural guide star tip/tilt and/or tip/tilt/focus sensors located within each client instrument. Extremely large telescopes are sensitive to errors due to the variability of the sodium layer. To reduce this sensitivity, NFIRAOS uses innovative algorithms coupled with Truth wavefront sensors to monitor a natural star at low bandwidth. It also includes an IR acquisition camera, and a high speed NGS WFS for operation without lasers. For calibration, NFIRAOS includes simulators of both natural stars at infinity and laser guide stars at varying range distance. Because astrometry is an important science programme for NFIRAOS, there is a precision pinhole mask deployable at the input focal plane. This mask is illuminated by a science wavelength and flat-field calibrator that shines light into NFIRAOS entrance window. We report on recent effort especially including trade studies to reduce field distortion in the science path and to reduce cost and complexity.

WFOS: a wide field optical spectrograph for the Thirty Meter Telescope

WFOS (Wide Field Optical Spectrograph) will provide near-UV, visible and near-IR multi-object spectroscopy and imaging capabilities for the TMT (Thirty Meter Telescope). The instrument concept is a multi-barrel approach, with four separate fields on the telescope focal plane providing a total of 92.4 square arcminutes of coverage. The core wavelength coverage is 340nm to 1000nm with an optional near-IR extension to 1.6 microns. Each barrel feeds two cameras allowing simultaneous spectral coverage in the blue and red. Spectral resolutions range from R150 to R7500 for a 0.75 slit using standard ruled transmission gratings and VPH technology. A GLAO (Ground Layer Adaptive Optics) system utilizing the TMT adaptive secondary mirror is included in the instrument concept. This paper describes the scientific goals for WFOS and the overall instrument mechanical, optical and system design.

Integrated modeling of the Canadian Very Large Optical Telescope

We describe the VLOT integrated model, which simulates the telescope optical performance under the influence of external disturbances including wind. Details of the implementation in the MATLAB/SIMULINK environment are given, and the data structures are described. The structural to optical interface is detailed, including a discussion of coordinate transformations. The optical model includes both an interface with ZEMAX to perform raytracing analysis and an efficient Linear Optics Model for producing telescope optical path differences from within MATLAB. An extensive set of optical analysis routines has been developed for use with the integrated model. The telescope finite element model, state-space formulation and the high fidelity 1500 mode modal state-space structural dynamics model are presented. Control systems and wind models are described. We present preliminary results, showing the delivered image quality under the influence of wind on the primary mirror, with and without primary mirror control.