Astronomy's Quest for Sharp Images by Pierre Léna

Author:Pierre Léna
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030558116
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

The nocturnal vision of the new instrument PUEO, equipped with the latest infrared digital camera with a million pixels, made a long line of discoveries right through to the 2010s (Lai et al. 1996). François and his wife Claude then took a well deserved retirement on the Mediterranean coast, after all their splendid contributions to astronomy.13

The originality and efficiency of this new adaptive design guaranteed it a fine future, in particular on the giant telescope Gemini Nord, with its diameter of 8.1 m, which received its first light in Mauna Kea in 1999, shortly after the VLT received its first light. Its anti-blur system was called Hokupa’a, meaning ‘motionless’, the name given to the Pole Star by the Hawaiians, who were excellent navigators on the Pacific.14 François Rigaut was one of those who had contributed to our success that night in Provence back in 1989. Now established in Hawaii with his companion, the engineer Céline d’Orgeville, he built Hokupa’a, then set up a laser star on the 8.1 m telescope Gemini Sud. So many talented French scientists working around the world to beat the blur!

Regardless of the crisis at the ESO, adaptive optics was quietly making its way in the world, for it was by now quite clear that it would open up a tremendous field of exploration, particularly in the search for exoplanets, the first of which had just been discovered. Sadly though, we were forced to admit that we had no alternative plan should the VLT not be equipped with such a system, and sooner rather than later.

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