Efficacy of predictive wavefront control for compensating aero-optical aberrations

David J. Goorskey; Jason D. Schmidt; Matthew R. Whiteley

doi:10.1117/1.OE.52.7.071418

15 March 2013 Efficacy of predictive wavefront control for compensating aero-optical aberrations

David J. Goorskey, Jason D. Schmidt, Matthew R. Whiteley

Author Affiliations +

Optical Engineering, Vol. 52, Issue 7, 071418 (March 2013). https://doi.org/10.1117/1.OE.52.7.071418

Abstract

Imaging and laser beam propagation from airborne platforms are degraded by dynamic aberrations due to air flow around the aircraft, aero-mechanical distortions and jitter, and free atmospheric turbulence. For certain applications, like dim-object imaging, free-space optical communications, and laser weapons, adaptive optics (AO) is necessary to compensate for the aberrations in real time. Aero-optical flow is a particularly interesting source of aberrations whose flowing structures can be exploited by adaptive and predictive AO controllers, thereby realizing significant performance gains. We analyze dynamic aero-optical wavefronts to determine the pointing angles at which predictive wavefront control is more effective than conventional, fixed-gain, linear-filter control. It was found that properties of the spatial decompositions and temporal statistics of the wavefronts are directly traceable to specific features in the air flow. Furthermore, the aero-optical wavefront aberrations at the side- and aft-looking angles were the most severe, but they also benefited the most from predictive AO.

Citation Download Citation

David J. Goorskey, Jason D. Schmidt, and Matthew R. Whiteley "Efficacy of predictive wavefront control for compensating aero-optical aberrations," Optical Engineering 52(7), 071418 (15 March 2013). https://doi.org/10.1117/1.OE.52.7.071418

Published: 15 March 2013

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available