Hokupa`a Anisoplanatism and Mauna Kea Turbulence Characterization
- 1 September 2002
- journal article
- Published by IOP Publishing in Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific
- Vol. 114 (799) , 1006-1015
- https://doi.org/10.1086/342183
Abstract
A data set of adaptive optics images has been analyzed in order to study the effects of angular anisoplanatism and to characterize Mauna Kea nighttime turbulence. The data set consists of a selection of Galactic center images obtained with the adaptive optics instrument Hokupa'a and the near-infrared camera QUIRC on the Gemini-North 8 m telescope. Using the Strehl ratio and the FWHM as tracers for anisoplanatism in the images, it is possible to draw conclusions about the effective turbulence height (h) over bar by model-fitting synthetic data. From the relatively small statistical sample, we obtain a median (h) over bar =3.5 km, with 10th and 90th percentiles being 2.2 and 5.6 km. The implications of these findings for a turbulence-conjugated adaptive optics system are addressed. We also find the Zernike modal equivalent of Hokupa'a to be Napproximate to18, i.e., on the average slightly better than 4 radial degreesKeywords
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