Large field-of-view Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor based on a high-density lens transfer function retrieval

Area of Science:

• Optical Engineering
• Wavefront Sensing Technology

Background:

• Conventional Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensors (SHWS) offer high accuracy but face field-of-view limitations.
• Emerging applications require wavefront sensors with an expanded field-of-view.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose and validate a novel high-density lens transfer function retrieval (HDLTR)-based SHWS.
• To overcome the field-of-view limitations of conventional compact SHWS.

Main Methods:

• Introduced an additional lens to converge large-aperture input wavefronts onto the sensor's detectable aperture.
• Employed densely sampled phase delays to retrieve the lens transfer function and isolate lens distortion.
• Utilized accurate demodulation of convergent wavefronts and a global spot matching method for reconstruction.

Main Results:

• Demonstrated a significant expansion of the SHWS field-of-view by a factor of 24.9.
• Achieved high wavefront reconstruction accuracy of less than λ/80.
• Successfully isolated lens distortion for accurate wavefront demodulation.

Conclusions:

• The proposed HDLTR-SHWS effectively expands the field-of-view while maintaining high accuracy.
• This technique addresses the growing demands for wider field-of-view wavefront sensing.
• The method provides a robust solution for wavefront reconstruction with a large dynamic range.