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AsteriaStar
Instrumentation

Wavefront Sensor

The eye of an adaptive-optics system — it measures, hundreds or thousands of times a second, exactly how the atmosphere has distorted the incoming light, so a correction can be computed and applied. Common designs are the Shack–Hartmann and pyramid sensors.

Used across the frontier

Knowledge connections

Sources

The primary and reference sources this topic draws on.

  • ESOEuropean Southern Observatory

    Southern-hemisphere observatory data and imagery (VLT, ALMA partner).