Twenty-four Hour, Horizon-to-Horizon Imaging with the AEOS and STARFIRE Telescopes

We've developed several novel imaging techniques that improve our ability to image through atmospheric turbulence. The use of these techniques will notably increase both the space-bandwidth product for diffraction-limited resolution performance and the available image contrast when performing speckle imaging with the Air Force's 3m-class telescopes. The increase in the space-bandwidth product means the Air Force will be able to monitor a larger sky area and for a more significant fraction of time than is currently achieved. The increase in image contrast will improve the Air Force's ability to observe faint objects due to their small size, distance away, or proximity to a much brighter object. The techniques, which capitalize on improving the synergy between how we collect and process images, include tomographic mapping of the wavefront using a single Shack-Hartmann sensor, dynamic aperture diversity, and a new optimization algorithm (Alternating Approximations).