Alignment and preliminary outcomes of an ELT-size instrument to a very large telescope: LINC-NIRVANA at LBT

LINC-NIRVANA (LN) is a high resolution, near infrared imager that uses a multiple field-of-view, layer-oriented, multi-conjugate AO system, consisting of four multi-pyramid wavefront sensors (two for each arm of the Large Binocular Telescope, each conjugated to a different altitude). The system employs up to 40 star probes, looking at up to 20 natural guide stars simultaneously. Its final goal is to perform Fizeau interferometric imaging, thereby achieving ELT-like spatial resolution (22.8 m baseline resolution). For this reason, LN is also equipped with a fringe tracker, a beam combiner and a NIR science camera, for a total of more than 250 optical components and an overall size of approximately 6x4x4.5 meters. This paper describes the tradeoffs evaluated in order to achieve the alignment of the system to the telescope. We note that LN is comparable in size to planned ELT instrumentation. The impact of such alignment strategies will be compared and the selected procedure, where the LBT telescope is, in fact, aligned to the instrument, will be described. Furthermore, results coming from early night-time commissioning of the system will be presented.Comment: 8 pages, 6 pages, AO4ELT5 Proceedings, 201

QCD and strongly coupled gauge theories : challenges and perspectives

We highlight the progress, current status, and open challenges of QCD-driven physics, in theory and in experiment. We discuss how the strong interaction is intimately connected to a broad sweep of physical problems, in settings ranging from astrophysics and cosmology to strongly coupled, complex systems in particle and condensed-matter physics, as well as to searches for physics beyond the Standard Model. We also discuss how success in describing the strong interaction impacts other fields, and, in turn, how such subjects can impact studies of the strong interaction. In the course of the work we offer a perspective on the many research streams which flow into and out of QCD, as well as a vision for future developments.Peer reviewe

The calibration procedure of the LINC-NIRVANA ground and high layer WFS

LINC-NIRVANA (LN) is a MCAO module currently mounted on the Rear Bent Gregorian focus of the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT). It mounts a camera originally design to realize the interferometric imaging focal station of the LBT. LN follows the LBT strategy having two twin channels: a double Layer Oriented multi-conjugate adaptive optics system assists the two arms, supplying high order wave-front correction. In order to counterbalance the field rotation a mechanical derotation is applied for the two ground wave-front sensors, and an optical (K-mirror) one for the two high layers sensors, fixing the positions of the focal planes with respect to the pyramids aboard the wavefront sensors. The derotation introduces a pupil images rotation on the wavefront sensors changing the projection of the deformable mirrors on the sensor consequently. The soft real-time computer load the matrix corresponding to the needed at one degree step. Calibrations were performed in daytime only and using optical fibers