In this project the student will investigate the feasibility of a 3D printed deformable mirror with an embedded water-cooling system, and its expected performance under extreme heat conditions based on the selected material and actuator configuration.

The DREAMS telescope is a 50cm class, wide-field, infrared telescope dedicated to the search of transient event. In this project we will work on developing its data reduction pipeline to increase the scientific output of the telescope and make it the ideal infrared complement to the Vera Rubin Observatory.

This project supports the development, upgrade, and operation of the ANU Quantum Optical Ground Station (QOGS) to enable an Australian deep-space optical ground station for engagement with international missions including NASA’s Artemis II.

The aim of this research is to determine the correlation of the tip-tilt to confirm that the downlink can be used as a reliable reference source for adaptive optics applied to the uplink signal.

This project aims to conceptualize a UV astronomical space mission to explore the interstellar medium (ISM) in the Milky Way and nearby Local Group Galaxies. Utilizing recent UV coating and detector advancements, the proposed mission involves high-throughput, compact UV spectroscopic instruments.

We are building a powerful new instrument to work with the Giant Magellan Telescope to record images and spectra ten times sharper than possible with the Hubble Space Telescope.

The ANU Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics (RSAA) is collaborating with the National Astronomical Observatory Japan to develop a next-generation Ground Layer Adaptive Optics (GLAO) system for installation on the 8-meter optical-infrared Subaru telescope at the summit of Maunakea, Hawaii.

Are you ready to blend academic and commercial experience? Can you dive into details and also see the bigger picture? Are you interested in seeing how your knowledge can be applied to real-world outcomes? If so, we’d love to hear from you.

Do you enjoy working with instrumentation? Are you interested in using data to inform real-world decisions? Are you an independent thinker who loves to solve problems? If so, we’d love to hear from you.

Students will work on technologies that enable high-data-rate optical communication links between satellites and ground stations, including quantum and classical communication systems. Demonstrations will be conducted with satellites in orbit and other test systems.

Atmospheric turbulence is the cause of degradation of resolution of telescopes in astronomy. Instruments have therefore been developed and equipped around observatories to monitor this turbulence. In this project, we will develop an instrument capable of measuring this turbulence during daytime through observations of stars in the infrared. This will result in the first turbulence profiler applicable during the day and useful to daytime astronomical observations, optical communications and satellite tracking.

CSIRO has a cold spray research group which is developing cold sprayed Invar. This project will be developing an optical metrology setup to measure the creep of the cold sprayed Invar in collaboration with CSIRO Lab22 in Clayton, Victoria.

This project aims to address the potential of Spatial Light Modulators (SLMs) as highly nonlinear optical elements, including their potential use in pyramid wavefront sensing.

This project aims to demonstrate the advantages of LGS-AO for deep space optical communications.

The successful applicant will work on one of several software related projects for the DREAMS infrared surveyor

In order to further the MAVIS design, an image simulator was built in Python, allowing star catalogs to be fed in, which are used to generate realistic MAVIS images. MAVIS now requires an IFU simulator to be developed, providing realistic IFU images from star catalogs.

Students will help commission and operate the Ring Image Next Generation Scintillation Sensor (RINGSS), a newly developed atmospheric turbulence profiling instrument, and analyse the resulting data to produce site statistics.

This project will build on the expertise and hardware available in the Advanced Instrumentation Technology Centre at the observatory to design and deliver a compact near-infrared spectrograph for the ANU 2.3m telescope.