Comparison study of the performance of piston, thin plate and membrane mirrors for correction of turbulence-induced phase distortions

In the framework of the Kolmogorov turbulence model and analytical and nume rical models of deformable mirrors, we investigated and intercompared the c orrection performances of piston, membrane and flexible faceplate (with eit her free edge, supported edge or clamped edge) adaptive mirrors featuring o rthogonal, hexagonal and segmented ring actuator structures. It was shown t hat all modal correctors provide similar correction performance, which is c lose to the performance of the ideal corrector with Karhunen-Loeve-type inf luence functions. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.