Group seminar at MPQ and Zoom: Deconvolution Techniques in Astronomy

Matthias Kluge, Max-Planck-Institute of Extraterrestrial Physics
Group seminar at MPQ lecture hall and Zoom
Tuesday, October 24 at 9:00am (MEZ)

Abstract: Astronomic images are blurred by atmospheric turbulence as well as diffraction and imperfections in the optical system. Several techniques have been developed to attempt a reconstruction of the underlying intrinsic light distribution. These techniques do improve the spatial resolution but also enhance noise and introduce ringing artifacts. In this talk, I will go present a few of these techniques and illustrate them with example images. The list includes deconvolution by division in Fourier space, Wiener Filtering, and the Richardson-Lucy iterative algorithm. I will also mention recent developments for handling extremely large convolution kernels. These techniques can be applied to a variety of scenarios like motion-blurred photographs, enhancing structures in the cores of galaxies, or separating blended sources in globular clusters or images of atoms.