J Opt
DOI 10.1007/s12596-017-0431-0
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Characterization of atmospheric optical turbulence by (GDIMM)
telescope
Sabah Al-ithawi1
Received: 27 June 2017 / Accepted: 18 October 2017
 The Optical Society of India 2017
Abstract In this paper, we present the measurements that
have been made to determine some of the parameters
governing the transmission of a light wave through the
atmosphere. Three parameters are studied: the parameter of
Fried r0, the angle of isoplanatic h0 and the external scale
l0. The data for this purpose have acquired by a generalized
differential image motion monitor. These data are used to
measure the position and scintillation of a star on two
windows. The device is composed of 3 sub-apertures
instead of 2 two pupils of a diameter d = 6 cm, detached
by a distance x0 = 20 cm horizontally. The difference
between the variations of the position of the star in each
window makes it possible to determine r0 and l0, while the
variation in the window (3) makes it possible to obtain the
scintillation used to calculate h0. The data used dated from
the night of October 24, 2016. A series of measures were
performed at the Calern plateau in Nice–France. The series
between 5:55 and 9:01 pm, with two focal lengths
F = 6.11 m, the star have been observed is Vega. The
measured wavelength was taken at 0.5 lm.
Keywords GDIMM  Seeing  Adaptive optics  Site
testing
& Sabah Al-ithawi
sa_laser@yahoo.com
1
Department of Laser and Optoelectronic Engineering,
University of Technology, Baghdad, Iraq
Introduction
The atmospheric turbulence is affected by light distortion
due to the degradation of astronomical image quality of
ground-based telescopes are a long known problem to
astronomers [1–3]. In classical astronomical observations,
the characteristics of atmospheric optical turbulence (OT)
are basically estimated by DIMM instruments [4–9]. For
several years, the Lagrange laboratory has developed
essential methods and apparatus to evaluate the optical
turbulence of the atmosphere [10]. It proposes a new
design, as the generalized differential image motion mon-
itor a compact instrument. GDIMM is very identical to a
DIMM, GDIMM has the features of being built-in and
simple to install, it’s also controlled by a devote software.
The work continues to make GDIMM completely auto-
mized [11].
The Earth’s atmosphere is an inhomogeneous medium
with temperature and pressure gradients, variations in
chemical composition, wind speed and direction. All these
factors cause the refractive index of the atmosphere to vary
according to position and time [12]. These index changes
modify the trajectory and the velocity of the rays which
pass through the atmosphere. This leads to a deformation of
the incident wavefront initially plane to a source point to
infinity (variation of the phase of the wave). The image of
an object observed from the Earth is thus degraded and
variable in time (the stars appear scintillating, the sun
deformed on the horizon). It is then necessary to introduce
a certain number of parameters characterizing the turbu-
lence of the atmosphere as The Cn2 (refractive index
structure parameter), the seeing e, the Fried parameter r0,
the isoplanatic angle h0 or the coherence time s0 and l0:
external scale.
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Theory
Fried parameter r0
In 1965 Fried proposed a so-called parameter of Fried, which
represents the spatial wavelength width of the perturbed
wavefront. This parameter is defined as the meter that should
have a telescope out of the atmosphere so that its resolution is
equivalent to that imposed by the turbulence. R0 is expressed
as a function of the optical energy of the turbulence char-
acterized by the constant of structure C2n (h) of the index
fluctuations Of air refraction given by Roddier [1].
2 33=5
Zþa
r0 ¼ 416:7k 2
Cn ðhÞdh5
2
: ð1Þ
0 angle from which the atmospheric degradation will change,
A parameter expresses the quality of the image at the
focal point of a telescope corresponds to the width at half
maximum of the diffraction spot was calculated by Dier-
ickx [17] as a function of the Fried parameter. It is the
seeing S defined by: S ¼ r0k r0 is a chromatic parameter and
varies in k5=6 (r0k5/6) while S is almost-achromatic and
varies in k1=6 (S ak-1/6).
The external scale l0
It defines the maximum size of wavefront disturbances that
remain consistent. The external scale l0 of the wavefront
coherence linked to the external scale characterizing the
turbulent dynamics and the function of the turbulence
optical energy characterized by the constant destructure
$?? 2
0 Cn(h)dh
It is computed by the equation:
r þ1 L0Cn2 ðhÞdh
1=3 0
l0 ¼ ð2Þ
r þa 2
0 Cn ðhÞdh
The domain of isoplanatic angle
The isoplanic field is defined as the field defined by the
isoplanatic angle h0 (the critical angle from which the
atmospheric degradation will change in the order of one to
a few s from arc), where the angle of isoplanatic corre-
sponds to the angle between two light beams coming from
the same object. Since the beams do not pass the exact
same volume of turbulence, decorrelation of the phase as a
function of the angular distance h, an important parameter
is the spatial separation of the beams at the altitude written
in the form: r = h h that is to say, if the angle is small
(r \ 10), the turbulence layer is located near the pupil and
the beams pass through regions of identical turbulence for
which the deformations of the wave fronts arriving at the
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J Opt
pupil, and when the apparent angle of the observed object
is large (r [ 10), the beams will be perturbed by com-
pletely different atmospheric degradations, it results a
decorrelation of the wavefronts arriving on the pupil then is
spoken of anisoplanatism.
The parameter h0 (isoplanatic angle) depends on the
altitude H, characteristic of the turbulent layers and the
parameter of Fried r0 by h0 = 0.314 r0/H, where H given by
" #5=3
r þ1
0 Cn2 ðhÞdh
H¼ ð3Þ
r þa 2
0 Cn ðhÞdh
Fried in 1982 showed that the isoplanatic angle corre-
sponds to the phase variance and which is expressed as a
function of the turbulence profile, and also the critical
it is defined by the following relation:
 3=5
Z þ1
h0 ¼ 2:905k2 Cn2 ðhÞdh ð4Þ
0
The coherence time
The coherence time s0 characterizes the time of evolution
of the deformations of the wavefront. The evolution of this
parameter, depends on the distribution of the wind (direc-
tion, velocity) [13]
s0 ¼ 0:314 r0 /v ð5Þ
where V is the wind velocity for the observation of imaging
with high angular resolution, the exposure time must be
less than the time of evolution of the turbulence.
The effects of turbulence
Scintillation
The most obvious manifestation of turbulence is the scin-
tillation of stars, which is observed by the human eye as the
brightness of stars, also the change of the color of a single
star corresponds to fluctuations in amplitude of the wave
reaching the ground. In case of small telescopes, the
scintillation is a random modulation of the overall inten-
sity, but for large telescopes it contributed to the total
degradation of an image. Relatively the scintillation
depends on the profile of the refractive index C2n and to
quantify it we use the expression of the spectral density of
the amplitude fluctuation. It is given by the model of
Kolmogorov equation below:
Z þ1
WA;0 ðf Þ ¼ 0:3870k 2
Cn2 ðhÞdhf 11=2 sin2 pkhf 2 ð6Þ
0
J Opt

The scintillation variance is the moment of order 2 of

the amplitude fluctuations is written as:
Zþ1
7=6
r2I ¼ 19:11k Cn2 h5=6 dh ð7Þ
0

Agitation

Among the effects of the degradations of the wavefront on

the images, one has the agitation at the focus of a telescope.
The agitation of the image in the focal plane of the tele-
scope corresponds to fluctuation of the phase, therefore a
fluctuation of the angle of arrival [14, 15]. From the
spectral density of fluctuation of AA which is directly
related by the spectral density of the phase we find the
functions of the variance and the covariance AA, which are
dependent on the characteristic parameters of the turbu- Fig. 2 The parameters of atmospheric turbulence
lence according to the model (Figs. 1, 2):
Kolmogorov model:
r2AA ¼ 0:1698k2 ro5=3 D1=3 ð8Þ
and on the Fried parameter as a function of variance, if the
variance in (rd2) is the following equation:
 3=5
r0 ¼ 0:3451k6=5 D1=5 r2AA ð9Þ

and if the variance in (arc second) is the equation:

 3=5
r0 ¼ 8:25105 D1=5 r2AA ð10Þ

Instrumentation

Telescope

The instrument that has been used is a Schmidt–Cassegrain

Fig. 3 Pupil mask of GDIMM
Celestron. This telescope is of a 280 mm diameter, consists

of an input mask with triple pupils as shown in Fig. 3. This

telescope is prolongation of the classic 2-DIMM mask
openings, the third pupil is to estimate the isoplanatic
angle. The shape of the two pupils are circular with a 6 cm
of diameter, a glass prism have been put in equippe in order
to give a bend of incident light at deflection angle of 30 arc
s, to make the separation of beam light parallel to the
declination axis.
Isoplanatic angle has been estimated from the third sub-
opening. This pupil is of a 10 cm diameter, a circular shape
and linked with a (4) cm obstruction, which is positional in
the center. The image was formed from this aperture cor-
responding to the optical axis. The control of this telescope
Fig. 1 isoplanatic angle h0 is computarised and allowing to acquire the information

123
 J Opt

more easily and accurately, equally it can be placed at a 5

meters high from the ground (Figs. 4, 5, 6, 7).

The camera

The high-speed CCD camera type Prosilica EC650, has a

sensor resolution of 659 9 493 pixels. The range which
formed of 12 bit. The EC650 is featured by small size, high
frame rate, high sensitivity and an excellent image quality.
The spectral of detectors offering over the entire visible
range with a peak at k equal 500 nm. The size dimension
of the pixels is 7.4 lm 9 7.4 lm. It benefits 90 frames per
second at full resolution. Equally, exposure control is 10 ls
to 10 s in 1 ls increment. A slight sampling of Airy discs
due to a Barlow lens raise the focal length by 7.8 m (5
pixels at k equal 500 nm in Airy’s disc, 10 cm of the sub-
pupil of diameter). The computer recognizes the camera
Fig. 5 Seeing (exp. time = 4 ms)
via a connected interface cable.

Experimental part

Measurements and statistics results

The Fried parameter r0 can be determined from the struc-

ture function D (x0; y0), which is calculated by making the
variance of the differential of the positions of the star
between each window. We start with pixel positions
(multiplied by 7.4 lm to convert to units in arc s) of the
star in each window. The differences in position are then
divided by the focal length F (application of the definition
of the angles of arrival) before calculating the variance.
Two structural functions emerge:
• a longitudinal function (for values along x); Fig. 6 The variation of the angle of isoplanatic in this configuration
varies between 9.8 and 13.8 ‘‘and The zenithal angle one took of the
file by examination 22 9 52: 51 we divide 52/60 and 51/3600 ? 220

• a transversal function (for the values following y);

We derive two expressions of the parameter of Fried,
thanks to the following relations:
 1 
5=3 1
Dðx0 ; 0Þ ¼ 0:36k2 r0l d3  0:54x0 3 ð11Þ
 1 
5=3 1
Dð0; y0 Þ ¼ 0:36k2 r0t d3  8:1x0 3 ð12Þ

where r01 corresponds to the longitudinal parameter, and r0t

corresponds to the transversal parameter.
These structure functions are weighted by the cosine of
the Zenithal angle of the star which evolves in time,
because as a function of this angle, the wave coming from
the star and reaching the apparatus can cross a Larger layer
of atmosphere, and thus undergo the effects of turbulence.
Fig. 4 The evolution of the Fried parameter for pupils

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J Opt
Fig. 7 The external scale l0 as a function of times
Focal length of 6.11 m. The longitudinal parameter
varies between 4 and 13 cm, and the mean (8.2) cm is the
transverse parameter between 3 and 5 cm. And the mean
(4) cm sees the concordance between the two evolutions is
quite good and the difference between the two curves is
due to the atmospheric conditions of the evening, in this
case the wind moving along the axis longitudinal. There
are three aberrations for the longitudinal curve, probably
due to vibrations of the machine horizontally (mechanical
error).
Then, from the Fride parameter, we can measure the
second most important parameter which is the seeing,
where this parameter allows to express the sharpness of the
images formed through the atmospheric turbulence. It
represents the angular diameter of a point object located at
infinity and corresponds to the mid-height width of the
diffraction spot, the seeing given by the relation:
e ¼ 0:98k=r0
Then again we see the concordance between the two
evolutions is very good and the values et1 are identical, it is
clear that the greater r0 is, better the visibility of the objects
to be observed. The angle of isoplanatic makes it possible
to define the region in which one can consider that the
atmosphere is the same for all the radii passing through it.
We can thus consider that the impulse responses of the
telescope and the atmosphere are constant. The value of the
isoplanatic angle h0 can be obtained in function of the
scintillation index r2I by the relation of Ziad et al. [16]:
ð  5Þ 8
h0 3 ¼ Aðcos zÞ3 s
where A = 0.198 and
 2 ments at Calern observatory. The measurements of total
2 I  hI i2
s ¼ rI ¼
hI i2
Comparing the obtained measurements, we take the total
flux for the window (3) that has a diameter of 10 cm and in
order to obtain a variation of the angle of Isoplanatic in
time.
External Scale when we speak of turbulent flow, one
designates the displacement of turbulences whose size is
within a certain domain, which can be assumed to be
homogeneous and isotropic. The external scale corresponds
to the maximum size of these turbulences. It is computed
here from the covariance at the origin C (0; 0), which
amounts to calculating the variance r2 of the positions of
the star. The latter is associated with r0 and l0 by the fol-
lowing relation:
 1 
5=3 1
r2D ¼ 0:17k2 r0 D3  1:525L0 3 ð16Þ
For isotropic turbulence, the variance in x that is asso-
ciated with r0l and the variance in y is associated with the
transverse r, then by taking the ratio between the three
pupils, one can easily calculate the external scale
r2D1 r2D1  1:525L01=3
l0 ¼ ¼ ð17Þ
r2D1r2D3 r2D1r2D3
We obtain the following distributions of Eq. (17):
The variations of the external scale are located between
0 and 7 m and the mean is 15 m. The transverse external
scale is smaller than the longitudinal scale, which again
reflects the presence of a more intense turbulent flow along
the transverse axis.
And the coherence time estimate by this relation:
r0
T 0 ¼ 0:3 ð18Þ
V
r0 estimate of the temporal structure function which is:
Dx; y ðtÞ ¼ hx jy ðtÞ  x jy ðt þ sÞi ð19Þ
ð13Þ
where s represents light velocity entering the
pupil = 6.6 ls, then the average of r0 following x direction
is 8.2 m, m represents the average wind speed at this eve-
ning is [1.5–2.9] m/s and then the coherence time (9 ms) is
longer than the exposure time (5 ms). The value of the
coherence time is not correct because the exposure time of
the camera must be greater than the coherence time.
Conclusion
In this work, we have shown how the combination of
ð14Þ
GDIMM is a powerful tool that can provide a substantial
information about what to expect from the future instru-
ð15Þ turbulence parameters allows us to evaluate the dominating
input of the ground turbulence (up to 500 m above
123

surface). It should be noted that the measurements are not
sufficient enough and the fluxes are not very great, also the
zenithal angles and the distance between the longitudinal r0
and the transverse r0 are not precise. For a site with little
turbulence, both components of the Fried parameter should
be much closer. The presence of turbulence is also found in
the L0 distribution, where again there is a discrepancy
between the longitudinal values and the transverse values.
These values correspond to the layer of turbulence closest
to the ground. In the end, all these results led to the fact that
this site Calern is not the ideal place to make observations,
if one tries to obtain at least the most accurate values
possible. All this is more true as this study does not take
into account the other sources of disturbances, such as the
light of the city of Nice.
Acknowledgements This work has been supported by the University
of Nice Sophia Antipolis in the laboratory (Lagrange) and Calern
observatory Nice, France. Special thanks to the authors Aziz Ziad for
his help to achieve this work.
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