Optical fabrication of the MMT adaptive secondary mirror

We describe the optical fabrication of the adaptive secondary mirror for the MMT. The 640 mm f/15 secondary consists of a flexible glass shell, 1.8 mm thick, whose shape is controlled by 336 electromagnetic actuators. It is designed to give diffraction-limited images at a wavelength of 1 micron. For generating and polishing, the shell was supported by attaching it to a rigid glass blocking body with a thin layer of pitch. It could then be figured and measured using techniques developed for rigid secondaries. The highly aspheric surface was polished with a 30 cm stressed lap and small passive tools, and measured using a swing-arm profilometer and a holographic test plate. The goal for fabrication was to produce diffraction-limited images in the visible, after simulated adaptive correction using only a small fraction of the typical actuator forces. This translates into a surface accuracy of less than 19 nm rms with correction forces of less than 0.05 N rms. We achieved a surface accuracy of 8 nm rms after simulated correction with forces of 0.02 N rms.