arXiv subjects

Matias Kidron

Publications and source records attributed to Matias Kidron.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Facility integration of the NASA IRTF adaptive secondary mirror

IRTF-ASM-1 has been functioning well since its first light in 2024. This adaptive secondary mirror (ASM) was primarily developed to be an on-sky demonstration of the new hybrid variable reluctance actuator technology at the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF). However, due to its physical robustness and our previous demonstrations of sensitivity enhancements with the ASM, we are interested in using it to optimize telescope image quality on a nightly basis. This will directly benefit science observations. However, as IRTF does not currently have adaptive optics expertise, we have been developing the system to be used with minimal human intervention. We present our progress in developing software for active optics mode with IRTF-ASM-1 using the single conjugate, facility 2x2 Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor Felix. We also present techniques for removing low-order, large amplitude non-common path aberrations between Felix and our science instruments.

astro-ph.IM↗

arXiv2026

Progress report on the integration of the IRTF adaptive secondary mirror

IRTF-ASM-1 is the first on-sky adaptive secondary mirror using the hybrid variable reluctance (HVR) actuators developed by the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research (TNO). Since its first light in April 2024, the ASM has continued to work consistently well with no hardware issues. The primary purpose of IRTF-ASM-1 is to serve as a demonstration of the HVR actuator technology, both in terms of verifying its robustness and testing calibration methods that are relevant to larger ASMs. However, as the ASM has proven to be easy to handle and reliable in its performance, we are moving toward integrating the ASM for long-term use at IRTF. We present closed loop results with the ASM and IRTF's off-axis facility wavefront sensor FELIX. Correcting the first seven Zernike modes through coma at 90-180 Hz, we are able to enhance the seeing by a factor of 1.8 in FWHM under 0."5 seeing conditions. We also performed the first science observations with the ASM in "static" mode and demonstrated that we can improve the throughput of IRTF's slit spectrograph by approximately a factor of 2, although this requires good reference slopes in FELIX. In the near future, we plan to optimize the calibration of reference slopes in FELIX and streamline the software so that the system can be operated by a non-AO expert.

astro-ph.IM↗

arXiv2024

First laboratory and on-sky results of an adaptive secondary mirror with TNO-style actuators on the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility

We are developing an adaptive secondary mirror (ASM) that uses a new actuator technology created by the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research (TNO). The TNO hybrid variable reluctance actuators have more than an order of magnitude better efficiency over the traditional voice coil actuators that have been used on existing ASMs and show potential for improving the long-term robustness and reliability of ASMs. To demonstrate the performance, operations, and serviceability of TNO's actuators in an observatory, we have developed a 36-actuator prototype ASM for the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) called IRTF-ASM-1. IRTF-ASM-1 provides the first on-sky demonstration of this approach and will help us evaluate the long-term performance and use of this technology in an astronomical facility environment. We present calibration and performance results with the ASM in a Meniscus Hindle Sphere lens setup as well as preliminary on-sky results on IRTF. IRTF-ASM-1 achieved stable closed-loop performance on-sky with H-band Strehl ratios of 35-40% in long-exposure images under a variety of seeing conditions.

astro-ph.IM↗