Adaptive optics at the University of Hawaii I: current performance at the telescope

The experimental adaptive optics system, currently developed at the University of Hawaii, is now equipped with a VME-based control system, and a high sensitivity wave-front sensor. The sensor uses an array of 13 photon-counting avalanche photodiodes which enable the system to work with faint reference or `guide' sources, as faint as magnitude 15. Results of the first successful observing runs are described here.