Women measuring stars: a comprehensive strategy for the exploitation of adaptive optics data

In the last decades, all the main existing telescopes have been equipped with Adaptive Optics (AO) facilities, and AO is considered an enabling technology for future giant telescopes. A significant limitation to the scientific exploitation of AO data is represented by uncertainties in the knowledge of the Point Spread Function (PSF), strongly linked to the need for optimised software tools for AO image analysis. We aim to develop a software package designed and optimised to analyse AO images with complex and spatially variable PSF to maximise the exploitation of high-precision quantitative science from past, present and future AO observations. The new software will address two problems: 1) extracting and modelling the AO PSF across the field of view directly from the AO imaging and spectro-imaging data and 2) extracting quantitative information from data featuring blended sources. The new methods will be validated on simulated images and available data from existing and upcoming AO facilities. The new software will be compliant with FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) principles. It will be written in open-source language, i.e. Python™, based on a version of the Starfinder software optimised to handle large-format images with variable and structured PSF.