MRI: Track 2 Development of Astrophysics Enabled by High Order Advanced Keck Adaptive Optics (HAKA)

An object seen at the bottom of a swimming pool appears blurry. A similar blurring occurs as astronomers look through the earth's atmosphere. A solution is the use of adaptive optics (AO), which uses a mirror that changes its shape to remove the blurring. One of the limitations to how well the blurring can be removed is determined by the number of actuators behind the deformable mirror. Keck Observatory has an adaptive optics system in use. This project will replace the existing Keck deformable mirror with one that has eight times more actuators. The resultant system will allow an improvement in most instruments currently used on the telescope. This will improve observations of old and cold exoplanets and improve ability to image the surfaces of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn. This project and the research team will indirectly support programs that provide training in astronomical instrumentation, such as the Akamai Internship Program and AstroTech summer school. The W. M. Keck Observatory is equipped with AO technology and a set of AO-fed science instruments. However, the AO system’s hardware linchpin – the deformable mirror (DM) – is now over twenty-five years old and its small number of actuators limits the overall AO performance. The High order Advanced Keck Adaptive optics (HAKA) project will replace the existing 349-actuator DM with a state-of-the-art 2800-actuator DM on the Keck II AO system. The HAKA-enabled science program will be carried out with a suite of existing and upcoming AO science instruments. HAKA will enable the direct imaging and spectroscopic characterization of dozens of exoplanets that will be too close to their host stars to be accessible to JWST and too cold to be accessible to today’s ground-based high contrast imaging instruments. HAKA will also enable Keck II’s AO system to operate in the z-band. This provides improved capability for Solar System science. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.