Palm 3000

Overview

Palm-3000 is an evolution of the older PALAO AO system on the 5-m Hale telescope at Palomar Observatory. It has been engineered specifically to optimize high-contrast studies of exoplanets orbiting nearby bright stars when used in conjunction with specialized speckle suppressing instrumentation, including Project 1640, the Palomar High-Angular Resolution Observer (PHARO), and the Palomar Fiber Nuller.

System Description

Optical Layout

PALM-3000 uses the same pair of matched PALAO off-axis parabolic (OAP) mirrors to retain a compact one-toone magnification optical relay. This economical design was adopted because of the need to reuse the PALAO deformable mirror (DM) within PALM-3000 and to respect the volume constraints within the Cassegrain cage environment of the Hale telescope. These OAPs were specified with λ/20 peak-to-valley surface quality over 90% of their clear aperture and have been recoated without refiguring twice since 1997. Reuse of the OAPs also retains the same 112 mm diameter internal relay pupil.

Deformable Mirrors

PALM-3000 uses two Xinetics DMs sequentially within a collimated optical space to apply appropriate optical phase corrections. This architectural choice was necessitated by the relatively low 1.06 μm actuator stroke of the dense highorder deformable mirror (HODM) relative to the turbulenceinduced requirement for total surface stroke (±5σ) of 4.1μm in conditions where r₀ = 9.2 cm at λ = 500 nm, corresponding to seeing of 1.12 arcsec FWHM. The combination of high-spatial-frequency, small-stroke correction from the HODM and lower-spatial-frequency, larger-stroke correction from the low-order deformable mirror (LODM) allows PALM-3000 to correct most atmospheric conditions observed at Palomar Mountain (in the worst seeing conditions, the finite total mirror stroke available eventually limits correction capability.) PALM-3000 uses a Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor with three different pupil sampling formats implemented through a lenslet array exchanger. This allows for the WFS to operate at 64, 32, 8 subapertures across the telescope primary. The reconfigurable approach allows performance optimization of PALM-3000 for targets spanning over 18 mag of brightness. The Shack-Hartmann detector is a 128×128 pixel split frame transfer E2V CCD50 packaged into a SciMeasure Analytical Systems "Little Joe" controller head, a platform originally developed for PALAO.

Instruments

P3K has been used with a number of different instruments including:

PHARO The workhorse instrument for P3K, it is a 1-2.2 micron infrared imager with a number of imaging modes.

PARVI A near-infrared fiber fed spectrograph for measuring radial velocity signals from exoplanets.

Stellar Double Coronagraph A flexible coronagraphic platform that allows for a number of different observing configurations, including multiple vortex coronagraphs.

Project 1640 A near-infrared coronagraph for the search for exoplanets.

SWIFT An I-band and z-band integral field spectrograph.

Publications

Note that this only includes the publications discussing the instrument. There are too many to list science publications using PALM-3000.

Design and performance of the PALM-3000 3.5 kHz upgrade Meeker, Seth R. ; Truong, Tuan N. ; Roberts, Jennifer E. ; Shelton, J. Chris ; Fregoso, S. Felipe ; Burruss, Rick S. ; Dekany, Richard G. ; Wallace, J. Kent ; Baker, John W. ; Heffner, Carolyn M. ; Mawet, Dimitry ; Rykoski, Kevin M. ; Tesch, Jonathan A. ; Vasisht, Gautam
Proc. SPIE, vol. 11448, 114480W (2020)
Copyright 2020 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2562931

Status of the PALM-3000 high order adaptive optics instrument
Burruss, Rick S.; Dekany, Richard G.; Roberts, Jennifer E.; Shelton, J. C.; Wallace, J. K.; Tesch, Jonathan A.; Palmer, Dean L.; Hale, David; Bartos, Randall; Rykoski, Kevin M.; Heffner, Carolyn M.; Eriksen, Jamey E.; Vescelus, Fred
Proc. SPIE, vol. 9148, 914827 (2014)
Copyright 2014 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.2055538

First exoplanet and disk results with the PALM-3000 adaptive optics system
Dekany, Richard; Burruss, Rick; Shelton, J. Chris; Oppenheimer, Ben; Vasisht, Gautam; Metchev, Stanimir; Roberts, Jennifer; Tesch, Jonathan; Truong, Tuan; Milburn, Jennifer; Hale, David; Baranec, Christoph; Hildebrandt, Sergi; Wahl, Matthew; Beichman, Chas; Hillenbrand, Lynne; Patel, Rahul; Hinkley, Sasha; Cady, Eric; Parry, Ian Proceedings of the Third AO4ELT Conference. Firenze, Italy, May 26-31, 2013

PALM-3000: Exoplanet Adaptive Optics for the 5 m Hale Telescope
Dekany, Richard; Roberts, Jennifer; Burruss, Rick; Bouchez, Antonin; Truong, Tuan; Baranec, Christoph; Guiwits, Stephen; Hale, David; Angione, John; Trinh, Thang; Zolkower, Jeffry; Shelton, J. Christopher; Palmer, Dean; Henning, John; Croner, Ernest; Troy, Mitchell; McKenna, Dan; Tesch, Jonathan; Hildebrandt, Sergi; Milburn, Jennifer Astrophysical Journal, Volume 776, 130 (2013) http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0004-637X/776/2/130/meta

Design and implementation of the PALM-3000 real-time control system T
ruong, Tuan N.; Bouchez, Antonin H.; Burruss, Rick S.; Dekany, Richard G.; Guiwits, Stephen R.; Roberts, Jennifer E.; Shelton, Jean C.; Troy, Mitchell
Proc. SPIE, vol. 8447, 84472F (2012)
Copyright 2012 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.927867

Results from the PALM-3000 high-order adaptive optics system
Roberts, Jennifer E.; Dekany, Richard G.; Burruss, Rick S.; Baranec, Christoph; Bouchez, Antonin; Croner, Ernest E.; Guiwits, Stephen R.; Hale, David D. S.; Henning, John R.; Palmer, Dean L.; Troy, Mitchell; Truong, Tuan N.; Zolkower, Jeffry Proc. SPIE, vol. 8447, 84470Y (2012)
Copyright 2012 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.926477

Palm-3000 on-sky results
Dekany, R.; Roberts, J.; Burruss, R.; Truong, T.; Palmer, D., Guiwits, S., Hale, D., Angione, J., Baranec, C., Croner, E., Davis, J. T. C., Zolkower, J., Henning, J., McKenna, D., Bouchez, A.H Second International Conference on Adaptive Optics for Extremely Large Telescopes.

Modeling The Detectability Of Exoplanets For The Palomar Extreme Adaptive Optics Palm-3000 System
Patel, Rahul; Metchev, S.
Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 43, 2011

Optical characterization of the PALM-3000 3388-actuator deformable mirror
Roberts, Jennifer; Bouchez, Antonin H.; Burruss, Rick S.; Dekany, Richard G.; Guiwits, Stephen R.; Troy, Mitchell
Proc. SPIE, vol. 7736, 77362E (2010)
Copyright 2010 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.857815

Status of the PALM-3000 high-order adaptive optics system
Bouchez, Antonin H.; Dekany, Richard G.; Roberts, Jennifer E.; Angione, John R.; Baranec, Christoph; Bui, Khanh; Burruss, Rick S.; Croner, Ernest E.; Guiwits, Stephen R.; Hale, David D. S.; Henning, John R.; Palmer, Dean; Shelton, J. Chris; Troy, Mitchell; Truong, Tuan N.; Wallace, J. Kent; Zolkower, Jeffry
Proc. SPIE, vol. 7736, 77361Q (2010)
Copyright 2010 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.857776

Status of the PALM-3000 high-order adaptive optics system
Bouchez, Antonin H.; Dekany, Richard G.; Angione, John R.; Baranec, Christoph; Bui, Khanh; Burruss, Rick S.; Crepp, Justin R.; Croner, Ernest E.; Cromer, John L.; Guiwits, Stephen R.; Hale, David D. S.; Henning, John R.; Palmer, Dean; Roberts, Jennifer E.; Troy, Mitchell; Truong, Tuan N.; Zolkower, Jeffry
Proc. SPIE, vol. 7439, 74390H (2009)
Copyright 2009 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.826571

High-order wavefront sensing system for PALM-3000
Baranec, Christoph
Proc. SPIE, vol. 7015, 70155M (2008)
Copyright 2008 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.788460

Real-time wavefront control for the PALM-3000 high order adaptive optics system
Truong, Tuan N.; Bouchez, Antonin H.; Dekany, Richard G.; Shelton, Jean C.; Troy, Mitchell; Angione, John R.; Burruss, Rick S.; Cromer, John L.; Guiwits, Stephen R.; Roberts, Jennifer E.
Proc. SPIE, vol. 7015, 70153I (2008)
Copyright 2008 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.790457

The PALM-3000 high-order adaptive optics system for Palomar Observatory
Bouchez, Antonin H.; Dekany, Richard G.; Angione, John R.; Baranec, Christoph; Britton, Matthew C.; Bui, Khanh; Burruss, Rick S.; Cromer, John L.; Guiwits, Stephen R.; Henning, John R.; Hickey, Jeff; McKenna, Daniel L.; Moore, Anna M.; Roberts, Jennifer E.; Trinh, Thang Q.; Troy, Mitchell; Truong, Tuan N.; Velur, Viswa
Proc. SPIE, vol. 7015, 70150Z (2008)
Copyright 2008 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.789777

High-contrast Adaptive Optics on the 200-in. Telescope at Palomar Mountain
Dekany, R.; Bouchez, A.; Roberts, J.; Troy, M.; Kibblewhite, E.; Oppenheimer, B.; Moore, A.; Shelton, C.; Smith, R.; Trinh, T.; Velur, V. Proceedings of the Advanced Maui Optical and Space Surveillance Technologies Conference, p.E64 (2007)

PALM-3000: visible light AO on the 5.1-meter Telescope
Dekany, Richard; Bouchez, Antonin; Britton, Matthew; Velur, Viswa; Troy, Mitchell; Shelton, J. Chris; Roberts, Jennifer
Proc. SPIE, vol. 6272, 6720G (2006)
Copyright 2008 Society of Photo Optical Instrumentation Engineers. http://dx.doi.org/10.1117/12.674496