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Hamamatsu Corp. - Earth Innovations LB 2/24

Building a Better Guide Star, Times Five

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Wavefront reconstruction of multiple beams improves telescope performance.

Hank Hogan

The nursery rhyme is half correct: Stars are not little, but they do twinkle — thanks to fluctuations in the atmosphere. Consequently, when astronomers peer upward, they get a less-than-perfect image of stars and planets. So they have turned to guide stars and adaptive optics to improve their ability to see. If no suitable natural guide star is present, they generate one using a laser. In this picture, a guide star is created with a laser beam fired upward from the MMT Observatory’s 6.5-m telescope atop Mount Hopkins in Tucson, Ariz. Images courtesy of Gabor Furesz. Now a group from...Read full article

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    Published: November 2006
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    photonics
    The technology of generating and harnessing light and other forms of radiant energy whose quantum unit is the photon. The science includes light emission, transmission, deflection, amplification and detection by optical components and instruments, lasers and other light sources, fiber optics, electro-optical instrumentation, related hardware and electronics, and sophisticated systems. The range of applications of photonics extends from energy generation to detection to communications and...
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