Simulation Validation of Phase-Diverse Speckle Imaging

Astronomers have long known that the resolution in ground-based astronomy is usually limited by aberrations introduced by the atmosphere. Over the years, researchers have developed a variety of clever pre- and post-detection approaches for correcting these effects, each with its own merits and regimes of operation. These approaches include stellar speckle imaging, deconvolution from wavefront sensing, and adaptive optics. We have been investigating a novel data-collection and processing approach for combating the effects of atmospheric seeing called phase-diverse speckle imaging.