| Scientific news TURBULENCE VELOCITY PROFILE CHARACTERIZATION WITH STEREO-SCIDAR 6 February 2017 WHT (CANARY) |
Stereo-SCIDAR is a high-altitude resolution and high sensitivity optical turbulence profiler. By measuring the intensity pattern of two nearby stars astronomers can triangulate the altitude and strength of optical turbulence in the Earths atmosphere. And by introducing a temporal delay between these two signals, they can also calculate the horizontal velocity of each layer.
Stereo-SCIDAR was developed by Durham University, UK as part of the Canary Adaptive-Optics demonstrator project (CANARY) on the William Herschel Telescope, and it has been operated on the Isaac Newton Telescope for a total of 28 nights.
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| Scientific news CANARYS SODIUM LASER GUIDE STAR SUCCESSFULLY COMMISSIONED 5 September 2016 WHT (CANARY) |
The latest upgrade to CANARY was commissioned between the 19th and 25th July, 2016 with the installation of the European Southern Observatorys Wendelstein sodium Laser Guide Star Unit (WLGSU) near the William Herschel Telescope. CANARY is an open-loop Adaptive Optics (AO) system that uses multiple laser-guide stars and deformable mirrors, providing the first on-sky test of combined wide-field Laser Guide Star (LGS) tomography and open-loop AO control.
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| Video release CANARY LASER IN ACTION 24 July 2015 WHT (CANARY) |
These videos were made while the laser guide star system of CANARY was being used at the William Herschel Telescope on 29 June, 2015. CANARY is a wide-field laser guide star tomography and open-loop AO (MOAO) demonstrator with the goal of emulating a single channel of the proposed E-ELT MOAO instrument, EAGLE, albeit at 1/10th scale. By coincidence the videos were obtained on the night the King of Spain, Felipe VI, was invited to join the observations at Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC) to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the inauguration of the Canarian Observatories.
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| Photo release CANARY'S LASER LAUNCH 30 August 2013 WHT (CANARY) |
CANARY is an open-loop Adaptive Optics system deployed on the 4.2m William Herschel Telescope from July 2010. CANARY uses multiple laser guide stars and deformable mirrors and will be the instrument that provides the first on-sky test of combined wide-field LGS tomography and open-loop AO control. On-sky validation of these combined techniques will be performed with the goal of emulating a single channel of the proposed E-ELT MOAO instrument, EAGLE, albeit at 1/10th scale. The EAGLE webpages contain many examples of the type of science that could be performed with such an MOAO instrument on the E-ELT.
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| Scientific news CANARY: FIRST ON-SKY DEMONSTRATION OF MULTI-OBJECT ADAPTIVE OPTICS 29 December 2010 WHT (CANARY) |
A Franco-British team has demonstrated for the first time on-sky the feasibility of so-called Multi-Object Adaptive Optics (MOAO). MOAO provides the high spatial resolution delivered by current adaptive-optics systems, but over a much larger field of view, allowing many objects to be observed simultaneously. The demonstration was made with the purpose-built CANARY instrument installed at the Nasmyth focus of the William Herschel Telescope on La Palma. Analysis of the first results obtained in September 2010 shows that CANARY delivered the expected performance the first time it was used - a spectacular success.
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