Editing Adaptive optics (section)

== History ==
[[File:Second adaptive thin shell mirror delivered to ESO.jpg|thumb|Adaptive thin shell mirror.<ref>{{cite news|title=Improved Adaptive Optics Mirror Delivered|url=http://www.eso.org/public/announcements/ann14010/|access-date=6 February 2014|newspaper=ESO Announcement}}</ref>]]
Adaptive optics was first envisioned by [[Horace W. Babcock]] in 1953,<ref>{{cite journal |url=https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/126606 |doi=10.1086/126606 |title=The Possibility of Compensating Astronomical Seeing |year=1953 |last1=Babcock |first1=H. W. |journal=Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific |volume=65 |issue=386 |page=229 |bibcode=1953PASP...65..229B |s2cid=122250116 |url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title='Adaptive optics' come into focus|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12500626|newspaper=[[BBC]]|date=18 February 2011|access-date=24 June 2013}}</ref> and was also considered in science fiction, as in [[Poul Anderson]]'s novel'' [[Tau Zero]]'' (1970), but it did not come into common usage until advances in computer technology during the 1990s made the technique practical.

Some of the initial development work on adaptive optics was done by the US military during the [[Cold War]] and was intended for use in tracking [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] satellites.<ref>{{cite news |title=For Sharpest Views, Scope The Sky With Quick-Change Mirrors|author=Joe Palca|url=https://www.npr.org/2013/06/24/190986008/for-sharpest-views-scope-the-sky-with-quick-change-mirrors|newspaper=[[NPR]]|date=24 June 2013 |access-date=24 June 2013}}</ref>

[[Microelectromechanical systems]] (MEMS) [[deformable mirror]]s and magnetics concept [[deformable mirror]]s are currently the most widely used technology in wavefront shaping applications for adaptive optics given their versatility, stroke, maturity of technology, and the high-resolution wavefront correction that they afford.