The evolution of robotic adaptive optics: Robo-AO 2 and SIGHT

Robo-AO was the first fully automated astronomical adaptive optics (AO) system, and was able to complete surveys of stellar objects in a fraction of the time of other AO systems. Two new robotic AO systems build on the heritage of Robo-AO. Robo-AO 2 is a site optimized system for the U. Hawai'i 2.2-m telescope on Maunakea, with an improved design and better sensitivity it will be able to continue the high cadence, high resolution observations that Robo-AO pioneered. SIGHT will be installed on the Palomar 200-inch telescope, and is designed to improve the delivered image quality to instruments at the Cassegrain focus (initially it will feed the Next Generation Palomar Spectrograph); the goal is to decrease the seeing by half. The two instruments have different science goals and performance requirements, but they share a common software architecture that allows the flexibility to do fully autonomous observations in these far different regimes. This presentation will discuss the development of the Robo-AO architecture and the evolution of that software into a more flexible system that can underpin the operation of different AO systems while still delivering fully autonomous capability.