Abstract

To guarantee the uniqueness of the solution for the wavefront phase, a series of intensity images with known phase diversities is usually needed in the current phase retrieval wavefront sensing methods. However, to obtain these intensity images with deliberately added diversity phases, some additional instruments (e.g., beam splitters) or operations (e.g., adjustment of the focus) are usually needed, which can pose a challenge for wavefront sensing in space telescopes. This paper proposes a new concept for retrieving the wavefront phase of monolithic mirror space telescopes with perturbations, where the intensity measurements with phase diversities are directly obtained from different field positions of one image, without the need for any additional instruments or operations. To realize this new concept, we present a modified phase diversity method to account for the unknown phase diversities between these intensity measurements based on an in-depth understanding of the net aberration fields induced by misalignments and figure errors. Relevant simulations for different cases are performed to demonstrate the feasibility and accuracy of the proposed method. Since in this method the phase diversities between different intensity measurements are mainly induced by the diversities in the field position, we call it the field diversity phase retrieval method. This work can present great facility for wavefront sensing in monolithic mirror space telescopes.

© 2017 Optical Society of America

Active alignment of space astronomical telescopes by matching arbitrary multi-field stellar image features

Xiaoquan Bai, Guohao Ju, Boqian Xu, Yan Gao, Chunyue Zhang, Shuaihui Wang, Hongcai Ma, and Shuyan Xu
Opt. Express 29(15) 24446-24465 (2021)

In-focus wavefront sensing using non-redundant mask-induced pupil diversity

Alexandra Z. Greenbaum and Anand Sivaramakrishnan
Opt. Express 24(14) 15506-15521 (2016)

Elimination of the field-dependent aberrations of the JWST-like space telescopes in the multi-field fine-phasing process

Guohao Ju, Changxiang Yan, and Zhiyuan Gu
Appl. Opt. 56(10) 2724-2740 (2017)

Evaluation of least-squares phase-diversity technique for space telescope wave-front sensing

David J. Lee, Michael C. Roggemann, Byron M. Welsh, and Erin R. Crosby
Appl. Opt. 36(35) 9186-9197 (1997)

Alignment of the active secondary mirror of a space telescope using model-based wavefront sensorless adaptive optics

Hongxi Ren, Bing Dong, and Yan Li
Appl. Opt. 60(8) 2228-2234 (2021)