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Results for “Laser guide star”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2013

MAPPING THE CLUMPY STRUCTURES WITHIN SUBMILLIMETER GALAXIES USING LASER-GUIDE STAR ADAPTIVE OPTICS SPECTROSCOPY

We present the first integral-field spectroscopic observations of high-redshift submillimeter-selected galaxies (SMGs) using Laser-Guide Star Adaptive Optics. We target H{alpha} emission of three SMGs at redshifts z {approx} 1.4-2.4 with the OH-Suppressing Infrared Imaging Spectrograph on Keck. The spatially resolved spectroscopy of these galaxies reveals unresolved broad-H{alpha} line regions (FWHM >1000 km s{sup -1}) likely associated with an active galactic nucleus (AGN) and regions of diffuse star formation traced by narrow-line H{alpha} emission (FWHM {approx}< 500 km s{sup -1}) dominated by multiple H{alpha}-bright stellar clumps, each contributing 1%-30% of the total clump-integrated H{alpha} emission. We find that these SMGs host high star formation rate surface densities, similar to local extreme sources, such as circumnuclear starbursts and luminous infrared galaxies. However, in contrast to these local environments, SMGs appear to be undergoing such intense activity on significantly larger spatial scales as revealed by extended H{alpha} emission over 4-16 kpc. H{alpha} kinematics show no evidence of ordered global motion as would be found in a disk, but rather large velocity offsets ({approx}few Multiplication-Sign 100 km s{sup -1}) between the distinct stellar clumps. Together with the asymmetric distribution of the stellar clumps around the AGN in these objects, it is unlikely that we are unveiling a clumpy disk structure as has been suggested in other high-redshift populations of star-forming galaxies. The SMG clumps in this sample may correspond to remnants of originally independent gas-rich systems that are in the process of merging, hence triggering the ultraluminous SMG phase.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2019

Laser Guide Star for Large Segmented-aperture Space Telescopes. I. Implications for Terrestrial Exoplanet Detection and Observatory Stability

Precision wavefront control on future segmented-aperture space telescopes presents significant challenges, particularly in the context of high-contrast exoplanet direct imaging. We present a new wavefront control architecture that translates the ground-based artificial guide star concept to space with a laser source on board a second spacecraft, formation flying within the telescope’s field of view. We describe the motivating problem of mirror segment motion and develop wavefront sensing requirements as a function of guide star magnitude and segment motion power spectrum. Several sample cases with different values for transmitter power, pointing jitter, and wavelength are presented to illustrate the advantages and challenges of having a non-stellar-magnitude noise limited wavefront sensor for space telescopes. These notional designs allow increased control authority, potentially relaxing spacecraft stability requirements by two orders of magnitude and increasing terrestrial exoplanet discovery space by allowing high-contrast observations of stars of arbitrary brightness.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

HWO Pupil Chopping Wavefront Sensing and Control FY24 Mini-Project Writeup

This document is a summary of work completed in June through July 2024 to assess the feasibility of implementing non-coronagraphic pupil chopping (PC) for Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) primary mirror segment stabilization with an on- and/or off-axis Natural Guide Star (NGS) or Laser Guide Star (LGS). This work considers three different PC configurations: (1) a non-common path (NCP) continuous low-order Deformable Mirror (DM), (2) using the telescope’s primary mirror (M1) segment(s), and (3) using a NCP low-order segmented DM. We show that option 2 likely needs a LGS for guiding, while options 1 and 3 may be able to guide on NGSs. We also separately evaluate spectral bandwidth limitations in the absence of photon noise, showing that the technique is limited to Δλ/λ ≲ 25% in a standard imaging configuration but Δλ/λ ≲ 150% when using a NCP Wynne corrector.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1994

An Overview of the Compensated Earth-Moon-Earth Laser Link (CEMERLL) Experiment

Adaptive optics can mitigate the turbulence-induced wavefront distortions that limit the minimum practical beam divergence in a ground-to-space optical link, and enable high intensity laser beam propagation through the atmosphere. The CEMERLL experiment will use laser guide star adaptive optics to transmit a near-diffraction-limited laser beam from the Starfire Optical Range to the Apollo lunar retro-reflectors. The experiment will validate theoretical models that predict the effect of atmospheric turbulence on uncompensated and compensated laser beam propagation, and explore strategies to compensate for atmosphere-induced wavefront tilt not corrected for by laser guide star adaptive optics.

adaptive↗
NASA NTRS1992

Prospects for imaging and astrometry on the ground and implications for space interferometry

The potential imaging performance of large telescopes using adaptive optics with laser guide stars, and of interferometers using laser phased subapertures are considered. The potential astrometric performance from the ground is also discussed. For each case the implications for a space interferometry mission are considered. The advantages of the space environment for optical and infrared astronomical interferometry are: transparency at all wavelength bands, no atmospheric turbulence, and the ability to cool optics for observation in the thermal infrared. However, ground based interferometry also has important advantages: the availability of large apertures and long baselines and generally lower costs. While transparency and thermal emission are fundamental, adaptive optics aided by laser guide stars shows promise to eliminate some of the effects of turbulence for ground based imaging. Other techniques such as phase referencing and closure phase can also be used to circumvent some of the effects of atmospheric turbulence. While it is a long step from the theoretical performance predictions for a ground based instrument to their attainment, a future space imaging interferometer must emphasize those capabilities which are impossible or at least very difficult from the ground: UV observations, very high dynamic range measurements, or high resolution measurements of faint, extended objects. The case for space astrometry is more clear: while ground interferometry can offer high accuracies over very small fields, a space interferometer can offer more than two orders of magnitude better performance over wide fields than that achievable with groundbased systems.

Colavita, M. Mark↗
NASA NTRS2022

Laser-Guided Space Interferometer

The mirrors of astronomical interferometers need to be aligned within a fraction of a wavelength relative to one another. This would be especially challenging for optical instruments with mirrors separated by hundreds of meters flying in Earth’s orbit. However, in this work, we show that this alignment can be achieved by means of: (i) flying the mirror cluster in a particular orbital configuration; (ii) closing a coarse positioning loop using GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System); and (iii) closing a fine wavefront-control loop using light from a laser guide star. The orbital configuration is designed to keep the mirrors passively pointing at the target star (up to a small orbital perturbation) while the interferometer cluster is orbiting and changing its baseline. The laser guide star would be flying in the same orbit but in the opposite direction. In medium- or high-Earth orbit, the interferometer would be able to observe a star for several hours per orbit. In this work, we analyzed the performance of an optical space interferometer consisting of nine 20 cm mirrors mounted on CubeSats and flying 3 km apart (together with a combiner and a laser guide star small satellite). This configuration supports a resolution of 0.04 milliarcseconds - an order of magnitude better than current ground-based interferometers. We estimate the performance of this system imaging stellar surfaces assuming perfect wavefront estimation and control.

Leonid Pogorelyuk↗
DOE OSTI2021

Trigonometric Parallaxes of Two T Dwarfs With Keck and ShaneAO Astrometry

We present trigonometric parallax and proper motion measurements for two T-type brown dwarfs. We derive our measurements from infrared laser guide star adaptive optics observations spanning five years from the ShaneAO/SHARCS and NIRC2/medium-cam instruments on the Shane and Keck telescopes, respectively. To improve our astrometric precision, we measure and apply a distortion correction to our fields for both instruments. We also transform the Keck and ShaneAO astrometric reference frames onto the ICRS using five-parameter parallax and proper motion solutions for background reference stars from Gaia DR2. Fitting for parallax and proper motion, we measure parallaxes of 73.5 ± 9.2 mas and 70.1 ± 6.7 mas for WISEJ19010703+47181688 (WISE1901) and WISEJ21543294+59421370 (WISE2154), respectively. We utilize Monte Carlo methods to estimate the error in our sparse field methods, taking into account overfitting and differential atmospheric refraction. Comparing to previous measurements in the literature, all of our parallax and proper motion values fall within 2σ of the published measurements, and 4 of 6 measurements are within 1σ. These data are among the first parallax measurements of these T dwarfs and serve as precise measurements for calibrating stellar formation models. These two objects are the first results of an ongoing survey of T dwarfs with Keck/NIRC2 and the Shane Adaptive Optics system at Lick Observatory.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2016

IROCKS: spatially resolved kinematics of z ∼ 1 star-forming galaxies

We present results from the Intermediate Redshift OSIRIS Chemo-Kinematic Survey (IROCKS) for sixteen z ∼ 1 and one z ∼ 1.4 star-forming galaxies. All galaxies were observed with OSIRIS with the laser guide star adaptive optics system at Keck Observatory. We use rest-frame nebular Hα emission lines to trace morphologies and kinematics of ionized gas in star-forming galaxies on sub-kiloparsec physical scales. We observe elevated velocity dispersions (σ ≳ 50 km s{sup −1}) seen in z > 1.5 galaxies persist at z ∼ 1 in the integrated galaxies. Using an inclined disk model and the ratio of v/σ, we find that 1/3 of the z ∼ 1 sample are disk candidates while the other 2/3 of the sample are dominated by merger-like and irregular sources. We find that including extra attenuation toward H ii regions derived from stellar population synthesis modeling brings star formation rates (SFRs) using Hα and stellar population fit into a better agreement. We explore the properties of the compact Hα sub-component, or “clump,” at z ∼ 1 and find that they follow a similar size–luminosity relation as local H ii regions but are scaled-up by an order of magnitude with higher luminosities and sizes. Comparing the z ∼ 1 clumps to other high-redshift clump studies, we determine that the clump SFR surface density evolves as a function of redshift. This suggests clump formation is directly related to the gas fraction in these systems and may support disk fragmentation as their formation mechanism since gas fraction scales with redshift.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2016

PROVIDING STRINGENT STAR FORMATION RATE LIMITS OF z ∼ 2 QSO HOST GALAXIES AT HIGH ANGULAR RESOLUTION

We present integral field spectrograph (IFS) with laser guide star adaptive optics (LGS-AO) observations of z ∼ 2 quasi-stellar objects (QSOs) designed to resolve extended nebular line emission from the host galaxy. Our data was obtained with W. M. Keck and Gemini North Observatories, using OSIRIS and NIFS coupled with the LGS-AO systems, respectively. We have conducted a pilot survey of five QSOs, three observed with NIFS+AO and two observed with OSIRIS+AO at an average redshift of z = 2.2. We demonstrate that the combination of AO and IFSs provides the necessary spatial and spectral resolutions required to separate QSO emission from its host. We present our technique for generating a point-spread function (PSF) from the broad-line region of the QSO and performing PSF subtraction of the QSO emission to detect the host galaxy emission at a separation of ∼0.″2 (∼1.4 kpc). We detect Hα narrow-line emission for two sources, SDSS J1029+6510 (z{sub Hα} = 2.182) and SDSS J0925+0655 (z{sub Hα} = 2.197), that have evidence for both star formation and extended narrow-line emission. Assuming that the majority of narrow-line Hα emission is from star formation, we infer a star formation rate (SFR) for SDSS J1029+6510 of 78.4 M{sub ⊙} yr{sup −1} originating from a compact region that is kinematically offset by 290–350 km s{sup −1}. For SDSS J0925+0655 we infer a SFR of 29 M{sub ⊙} yr{sup −1} distributed over three clumps that are spatially offset by ∼7 kpc. The null detections on three of the QSOs are used to infer surface brightness limits and we find that at 1.4 kpc from the QSO the un-reddened star formation limit is ≲0.3 M{sub ⊙} yr{sup −1} kpc{sup −2}. If we assume typical extinction values for z = 2 type-1 QSOs, the dereddened SFR for our null detections would be ≲0.6 M{sub ⊙} yr{sup −1} kpc{sup −2}. These IFS observations indicate that while the central black hole is accreting mass at 10%–40% of the Eddington rate, if star formation is present in the host (1.4–20 kpc) it would have to occur diffusely with significant extinction and not in compact, clumpy regions.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2015

DISCOVERY OF LOW-METALLICITY STARS IN THE CENTRAL PARSEC OF THE MILKY WAY

We present a metallicity analysis of 83 late-type giants within the central 1 pc of the Milky Way. K-band spectroscopy of these stars was obtained with the medium spectral resolution integral-field spectrograph NIFS on Gemini North using laser-guided star adaptive optics. Using spectral template fitting with the MARCS synthetic spectral grid, we find that there is a large variation in the metallicity, with stars ranging from [M/H] < −1.0 to above solar metallicity. About 6% of the stars have [M/H] < −0.5. This result is in contrast to previous observations with smaller samples that show stars at the Galactic center having approximately solar metallicity with only small variations. Our current measurement uncertainties are dominated by systematics in the model, especially at [M/H] > 0, where there are stellar lines not represented in the model. However, the conclusion that there are low-metallicity stars, as well as large variations in metallicity, is robust. The metallicity may be an indicator of the origin of these stars. The low-metallicity population is consistent with that of globular clusters in the Milky Way, but their small fraction likely means that globular cluster infall is not the dominant mechanism for forming the Milky Way nuclear star cluster. The majority of stars are at or above solar metallicity, which suggests they were formed closer to the Galactic center or from the disk. In addition, our results indicate that it will be important for star formation history analyses using red giants at the Galactic center to consider the effect of varying metallicity.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS2014

Imaging Transitional Disks with TMT: Lessons Learned from the SEEDS Survey

TMT studies of the early phases of giant planet formation will build on studies carried out in this decade using 8-meter class telescopes. One such study is the Strategic Exploration of Exoplanets and Disks with Subaru transitional disk survey. We have found a wealth of indirect signatures of giant planet presence, including spiral arms, pericenter offsets of the outer disk from the star, and changes in disk color at the inner edge of the outer disk in intermediate-mass PMS star disks. T Tauri star transitional disks are less flamboyant, but are also dynamically colder: any spiral arms in these diskswill be more tightly wound. Imaging such features at the distance of the nearest star-forming regions requires higher angular resolution than achieved with HiCIAO+ AO188. Imaging such disks with extreme AO systems requires use of laser guide stars, and are infeasible with the extreme AO systems currently commissioning on 8-meter class telescopes. Similarly, the JWST and AFTAWFIRST coronagraphs being considered have inner working angles 0.2, and will occult the inner 28 atomic units of systems at d140pc, a region where both high-contrast imagery and ALMA data indicate that giant planets are located in transitional disks. However, studies of transitional disks associated with solar-mass stars and their planet complement are feasible with TMT using NFIRAOS.

star-forming regions↗
DOE OSTI2013

STELLAR POPULATIONS IN THE CENTRAL 0.5 pc OF THE GALAXY. I. A NEW METHOD FOR CONSTRUCTING LUMINOSITY FUNCTIONS AND SURFACE-DENSITY PROFILES

We present new high angular resolution near-infrared spectroscopic observations of the nuclear star cluster surrounding the Milky Way's central supermassive black hole. Using the integral-field spectrograph OSIRIS on Keck II behind the laser-guide-star adaptive optics system, this spectroscopic survey enables us to separate early-type (young, 4-6 Myr) and late-type (old, >1 Gyr) stars with a completeness of 50% down to K' = 15.5 mag, which corresponds to {approx}10 M {sub Sun} for the early-type stars. This work increases the radial extent of reported OSIRIS/Keck measurements by more than a factor of three from 4'' to 14'' (0.16 to 0.56 pc), along the projected disk of young stars. For our analysis, we implement a new method of completeness correction using a combination of star-planting simulations and Bayesian inference. We assign probabilities for the spectral type of every source detected in deep imaging down to K' = 15.5 mag using information from spectra, simulations, number counts, and the distribution of stars. The inferred radial surface-density profiles, {Sigma}(R){proportional_to}R {sup -{Gamma}}, for the young stars and late-type giants are consistent with earlier results ({Gamma}{sub early} = 0.93 {+-} 0.09, {Gamma}{sub late} = 0.16 {+-} 0.07). The late-type surface-density profile is approximately flat out to the edge of the survey. While the late-type stellar luminosity function is consistent with the Galactic bulge, the completeness-corrected luminosity function of the early-type stars has significantly more young stars at faint magnitudes compared with previous surveys with similar depth. This luminosity function indicates that the corresponding mass function of the young stars is likely less top-heavy than that inferred from previous surveys.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2013

KECK OBSERVATIONS OF THE GALACTIC CENTER SOURCE G2: GAS CLOUD OR STAR?

We present new observations and analysis of G2-the intriguing red emission-line object which is quickly approaching the Galaxy's central black hole. The observations were obtained with the laser guide star adaptive optics systems on the W. M. Keck I and II telescopes (2006-2012) and include spectroscopy (R {approx} 3600) centered on the hydrogen Br{gamma} line as well as K' (2.1 {mu}m) and L' (3.8 {mu}m) imaging. Analysis of these observations shows the Br{gamma} line emission has a positional offset from the L' continuum. This offset is likely due to background source confusion at L'. We therefore present the first orbital solution derived from Br{gamma} line astrometry, which, when coupled with radial velocity measurements, results in a later time of closest approach (2014.21 {+-} 0.14), closer periastron (130 AU, 1600 R{sub s}), and higher eccentricity (0.9814 {+-} 0.0060) compared to a solution using L' astrometry. It is shown that G2 has no K' counterpart down to K' {approx} 20 mag. G2's L' continuum and the Br{gamma} line emission appears unresolved in almost all epochs, which implies that the bulk of the emission resides in a compact region. The observations altogether suggest that while G2 has a gaseous component that is tidally interacting with the central black hole, there is likely a central star providing the self-gravity necessary to sustain the compact nature of this object.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗