CANARY: the on-sky NGS/LGS MOAO demonstrator for EAGLE
2008
EAGLE is a multi-object 3D spectroscopy instrument currently under design for the 42-metre European Extremely Large
Telescope (E-ELT). Precise requirements are still being developed, but it is clear that EAGLE will require (~100 x 100
actuator) adaptive optics correction of ~20 - 60 spectroscopic subfields distributed across a ~5 arcminute diameter field
of view. It is very likely that LGS will be required to provide wavefront sensing with the necessary sky coverage. Two
alternative adaptive optics implementations are being considered, one of which is Multi-Object Adaptive Optics
(MOAO). In this scheme, wavefront tomography is performed using a set of LGS and NGS in either a completely open-loop
manner, or in a configuration that is only closed-loop with respect to only one DM, probably the adaptive M4 of the
E-ELT. The fine wavefront correction required for each subfield is then applied in a completely open-loop fashion by
independent DMs within each separate optical relay. The novelty of this scheme is such that on-sky demonstration is
required prior to final construction of an E-ELT instrument. The CANARY project will implement a single channel of an
MOAO system on the 4.2m William Herschel Telescope. This will be a comprehensive demonstration, which will be
phased to include pure NGS, low-order NGS-LGS and high-order woofer-tweeter NGS-LGS configurations. The LGSs
used for these demonstrations will be Rayleigh systems, where the variable range-gate height and extension can be used
to simulate many of the LGS effects on the E-ELT. We describe the requirements for the various phases of MOAO
demonstration, the corresponding CANARY configurations and capabilities and the current conceptual designs of the
various subsystems.
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