ABSTRACT
Michael J Damzen and Carl Paterson Adaptive optics techniques, originally developed in the context of ground-based astronomy to com-
pensate dynamically for optical aberrations arising from turbulence in the Earth’s atmosphere, have found application in a number of aspects of laser system design. Intracavity adaptive optics allows fine-tuning of the laser cavity, for example, to compensate for thermal lensing effects and drift or to optimize efficiency automatically as operating parameters change. Extracavity adaptive optics systems are used widely in beamshaping, beam-steering and temporal pulse shaping applications. The use of lasers in astronomy is discussed in chapter D8.
