Abstract

The emergence of new wavefront sensing techniques, such as wavefront curvature sensing, opens new pathways for astronomical adaptive optics. Even though the advantages and drawbacks of Shack-Hartmann and curvature wavefront sensing are known [1,2], no direct comparison of complete systems has yet been presented. The goal of this paper is to investigate and compare the performance of Shack-Hartmann and curvature based systems for an eight-meter telescope, evaluated at a 1.6 µm wavelength under median Mauna Kea seeing conditions. This work was made at the request of the Gemini adaptive optics working group, who asked three independant parties to perform adaptive optics system simulations using both technologies. To make the comparison simple enough, a set of conditions was imposed on seeing, telescope size, and wavefront sensor detectors, as summarized in Table 1. Independant simulation codes were used. A common atmospheric turbulence generator provided consistant inputs for all packages.

© 1996 Optical Society of America