Abstract

The low-order (focus and astigmatism) aberrations induced in a thermally bloomed medium with transverse flow were measured. The maximum focus OPD for a 10-cm aperture was measured to be ~0.4 μm at an I_rel ≅ 0.5. The maximum astigmatism OPD was measured to be ~1.4 μm at an I_rel ≅ 0.4. The low-order aberrations were dominant at I_rel ≥ 0.4. For I_rel ⪝ 0.4, higher-order terms become more important. Using the measured values of focus and astigmatism as inputs, a loop was closed around a deformable mirror to correct for the measured aberrations. The presence of an iterative condition in which correction for thermal blooming leads to a more severe condition of blooming, and so on, was observed. However the loop converged to a stable condition. The maximum increase in peak intensity on target achieved by closing the loops was 30–40%.

© 1984 Optical Society of America

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