Lewis Roberts (The Boeing Company), L. William Bradford (The Boeing Company), Mark A. Skinner (The Boeing Company)
Theo A. ten Brummelaar (The CHARA Array), Nils H. Turner (The CHARA Array), Ben R. Oppenheimer (Department of Astrophyics, American Museum of Natural History), Andrew P. Digby (Department of Astrophyics, American Museum of Natural History), Marshall D. Perrin (University of California)
Keywords: Aperture masking
Abstract:
Non-redundant aperture masking is a form of interferometry, where the aperture of the telescope is divided into two or more sub-apertures. There is no need for path length equalization or the other complex equipment that is required for long-baseline interferometry. The light from these subapertures interferes and details of the shape of the object can be determined by analyzing the resulting fringe patterns.
We have collected pupil images with the AEOS telescope and use these real data to simulate the effects that variations in the amplitude of the incoming wavefront (ie. scintillation) has on the visibility measured by a two-element aperture system. We find that scintillation has little effect on observations taken above 60 degrees elevation and what little effect there is can be calibrated out. At low elevations, the effects are more significant and harder to calibrate. Scintillation will have little effect on most astronomical imaging situations, but it will be a problem if the technique is used to observe fast moving low-Earth satellites.
Date of Conference: September 10-14, 2006
Track: Poster