Comparison of stacked actuator and bimorph mirrors for scattered laser-beam focusing

Bimorph deformable mirrors can be successively used to improve focusing of a laser beam passed through a moderately scattering medium with optical density in the range of 1 ... 10. In this paper we investigate the efficiency of the stacked actuator deformable mirror with 61 piezo stacks and clear aperture of 60 mm. We demonstrate that such kind of mirrors also can be used to optimize the focal spot in the far-field. Shack-Hartmann sensor was used to measure the averaged wavefront distortions and CCD camera was used to estimate the intensity distribution of the focal spot in the far-field.