Adaptive optics is a technology used to improve the quality of images captured by telescopes, especially those located on Earth. It works by correcting for distortions in the incoming light caused by Earth’s atmosphere. These distortions, known as “atmospheric turbulence,” cause stars and other celestial objects to appear blurry or twinkling when viewed through a telescope. The atmosphere causes light to bend and shift unpredictably, leading to poor image quality.
Here’s how adaptive optics works:
- Wavefront Sensing: The system uses a reference star (or laser guide star) to measure the distortions in the incoming light. A device called a wavefront sensor detects the way the light has been distorted by the atmosphere.
- Real-time Corrections: Based on the wavefront data, a computer calculates the required corrections to the telescope’s optics. These adjustments need to be made in real-time because the atmospheric conditions change constantly.
- Deformable Mirror: The telescope has a deformable mirror that can change shape very quickly. The mirror’s surface is adjusted by the system to compensate for the distortions in the incoming light. This allows the telescope to “correct” for the atmospheric turbulence on-the-fly.
- Sharper Images: After the system makes these real-time corrections, the telescope can capture images that are much sharper and more detailed than they would be without adaptive optics. This technology allows astronomers to observe celestial objects with much greater clarity, almost as if the telescope were in space, where there is no atmospheric distortion.
Adaptive optics has greatly improved the resolution of ground-based telescopes, allowing them to rival space-based observatories in certain ways, particularly for observing the night sky in optical and infrared wavelengths.