Study of structural optimization applied to terrestrial telescope design

Abstract

L’objectiu del treball és desenvolupar una metodologia d’optimització estructural de miralls de telescopis terrestres. Aquesta metodologia ha de ser aplicada per al disseny dels miralls secundaris del EELT (European Extremely Large Telescope). This study is to design the support structure of ELT's (ExtremelyLargeTelescop e) M2 mirror. On the basis of the conceptual architecture given by ESO (European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere),the structure designis developed from an ideal stage,in which the mirror interface forces are optimized, to a final stage, where the structural requirements are assessed in the detail design.These requirements involve deformations of the mirror's optical surface,eigen frequencies of the structure and sensitivity analysis of many possible perturbations. Finally, an optimization process is carried out in order to reduce the weight of the structure while increasing the safety margin in the eigen frequencies requireme