Because our vision of the night sky is blurred by turbulence in the Earth’s atmosphere, the detail we can see of the universe is extremely limited – even through the most powerful terrestrial telescopes. When we look up at the sky, we perceive this as the twinkling of stars.

One way we have found to overcome the atmospheric distortion, is to place telescopes outside the atmosphere, such as the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). Considering that it cost about $2 billion to build and launch the HST, with another billion to maintain and repair it, the need for alternative technologies becomes clear.

As early as 1953, Horace Babcock coined the idea of measuring the distortions present in the light received on Earth from the stars above (commonly called “wavefronts”) and quickly correcting them to compensate for the rapidly changing patterns of atmospheric turbulence. However, we would have to wait until the 1990’s for the technology necessary to realize this feat.

There are three basic components of an adaptive optics system that work together in a continuous loop.

• Wavefront sensor — An array of highly sensitive micro-lenses and transfer circuits able to detect and transmit information about the light received.
• Deformable mirror — Able to execute the commands from the feedback and control algorithms by quickly adapting its reflective surface to compensate for turbulence
• Software feedback and control algorithms — Able to analyze instantaneously the information received from the wavefront sensor and send commands to the deformable mirror

Speed is the primary challenge we face when using adaptive optics technology to see through the atmosphere. By its very nature, turbulence is in a state of constant flux that continuously affects incoming light. To compensate, the deformable mirror must and the feedback and control system must be fast enough to keep up.

In freespace communications, for example, the needs are similar to those in astronomy when compensating for atmospheric turbulence - users need to correct quickly... very quickly.

Contrary to that, the needs in the field of high-power laser correction are very different because optical quality is the key factor and not reaction time of the optical system. Then again, in the field of microscopy, the need rests in the deformable mirrors capacity to correct aberrations in increased spatial frequency while remaining physically compact enough to to be used in this domain.

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