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20 years of AO at ESO

20 years of AO at ESO. MACAO-CRIRES, or how to recycle a good idea. Multi-application curvature AO. MACAO was developed initially for VLTI needs Two sisters of MACAO-VLTI benefited from it, SINFONI and CRIRES

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20 years of AO at ESO

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  1. 20 years of AO at ESO MACAO-CRIRES, or how to recycle a good idea

  2. Multi-application curvature AO • MACAO was developed initially for VLTI needs • Two sisters of MACAO-VLTI benefited from it, SINFONI and CRIRES • CRIRES could have been the first Coudé instrument, instead of the actual Nasmyth AO (f/15 focus)

  3. CRIRES for dummies

  4. MACAO and CRIRES in a nutshell: • Near IR-spectrograph 1 =>5 m • High resolution (105) • 4x1k Aladdin detectors • 0.2" slit width, 0.1" pixel • Slit viewer, 0.05” pixel • AO-assisted (MACAO-family) • Curvature AO (robust, low maintenance, APDs) • 60 element bimorph DM / lenslets • 420 Hz loop frequency, 60 Hz bandwidth • Strehl >50% for R<13 • Off-axis guiding in a ~50" field of view • Sub-arcsec resolution along the slit • IR Slit-viewing guiding facility (1k detector)

  5. High spectral resolution • for one molecular species typically several hundred rotation transitions can be seen, sampling:- different zones spatially- different physical conditions, e.g. T • Better isotopic separation • A higher resolution allows filtering out many emission lines of the atmosphere • High absolute accuracy (RV e.g. for embedded stars) • See Käufl et al., SPIE, 2004

  6. Higher spatial resolution • MACAO provides an excellent image quality for the Paranal site • Diffraction-limit imaging is routinely achieved, with a high loop robustness • Ensquared energy (0.2”) higher than 50% in K-band for MR brighter than 14 (Paufique et al, SPIE, 2008) • Spatial resolution goes from 0.4” in good seeing conditions down to <0.1” over wide wavelength range (1.6 -> 3.5 µm) • (lesser) Correction on extended objects: comets nuclei, satellites, Mars features !! • AO criterion: enslitted energy, expected up to 70% for bright stars • Solar system objects tracking • Elevation mode off-axis tracking • AO criterion: enslitted energy, expected up to 70% for bright stars Io in K-band (raw), MACAO-CRIRES commissioning 2006

  7. All together • Both high spatial and spectral resolution allows retrieving exquisitely fine information on astrophysical objects • Model-dependent: discrimination down to 0.8 mas has been reached, using spectro-astrometry (Pontoppidan et al., ApJ 2008) • No competition existing in the 8-10 m class telescopes

  8. Where did CRIRES come from? • MACAO for VLTI and MACAO for SINFONI were the baseline for the MACAO projects • Individual components were re-used for CRIRES => design and tests greatly simplified

  9. Concepts, finite product

  10. AO developments and recycling

  11. MACAO-CRIRES milestones • CRIRES FDR 2001 • End of MACAO lab tests 02/2006 • Reintegration in Paranal 03/2006 • First light: 6th 04/2006 • CRIRES commissioning: 2007

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