CIAO is a Compact Innovative Adaptive Optic system for 0.5 to 2 m telescopes. Pic du Midi observatory is known for the quality of its planetary images thanks to the site quality and the long experience of the team. The technique is still improving; our last step is the development of an adaptive optics system. This compact and affordable system, developed in collaboration with Observatoire de Paris could also interest other observatories with telescopes in the 0.5 to 2m range. We are able to analyze the wave front of the target at 1000 Hz, with a rejection bandwidth of correction up to 100 Hz on bright targets. On fainter targets, the system can still run slower, it is used in this case as an active optics to compensate the static defaults of the telescope or slow evolution of the air turbulence. The first tests on the sky were at the end of October. The device worked as expected and the results are very encouraging. We have been able to improve the image quality by a factor 4 on several targets such as stars and the planet Mars. We will present in this conference how an adaptice optics system works, the prototype architecture and how we implemented it on the Nasmyth focal plane of the 1m diameter telescope at Pic du Midi. Many results will be presented including video showing in realtime the gain of the adaptive optics. The best known images of Mars in this orbit situation will be shown. We thank PNP (Programme National de Planétogie), Paris Observatory scientific Council and IMCCE (Institut de Mécanique Céleste et de Calcul des Ephémérides) for their financial support and Jean-Luc Dauvergne for his help on the project.

Date Published: 24 May 2018
PDF
Proc. SPIE 10677, Unconventional Optical Imaging, 106771U (24 May 2018); doi: 10.1117/12.2311461

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 10677:
Unconventional Optical Imaging
Corinne Fournier; Marc P. Georges; Gabriel Popescu, Editor(s)