Wakea Consulting — Software & Control for Astronomy and Adaptive Optics

About Us

Dedicated to Excellence in Adaptive Optics

Wakea Consulting is a highly specialized software consulting firm dedicated to delivering tailored solutions to our clients. We are a team of skilled professionals who bring expertise in adaptive optics to tackle the most complex challenges.

Driven by our commitment to delivering superior results, we take pride in our personalized approach to addressing each client's unique needs. We firmly believe that our expertise and dedication to excellence can help our clients reach their full potential in ever-evolving environments.

Our Team

Sylvain Cetre

Founder & Director

With over 20 years of experience in Adaptive Optics and Real Time Control, Sylvain brings his expertise to help clients tackle their most complex challenges. Passionate about innovation and excellence, he is committed to delivering high-quality software solutions that empower our clients' systems to reach their full potential.

Marie Cetre

Founder & President

Marie is responsible for the company's administrative management and maintains close contact with our clients. Her expertise and commitment to excellence ensure that our clients achieve superior results.

Selected Work

Projects

Here are some of the projects we are working on. We thank our clients for giving us the opportunity to work on these incredible systems.

ONERA · CNRS / LAM · Bertin Alpao · Wakea Consulting

RAMA

RAMA is an adaptive optics (AO) testbench deployed on ONERA's 60 cm FEELINGS telescope. Designed as a pathfinder for future systems like the PROVIDENCE ground station, RAMA evaluates a visible, non-modulated Pyramid Wavefront Sensor (PWFS). The hardware baseline also includes two pupil-conjugated deformable mirrors (DM97 and DM192) driven by the DAO Real-Time Computer (RTC). Inheriting the modular and evolving philosophy of the PAPYRUS project, the bench provides a flexible environment to test new components on-sky and allows for direct comparisons between classical controllers and advanced, data-driven strategies.

W.M. Keck Observatory

Real-Time Computer (RTC)

A GPU based RTC for natural and laser guide star at the summit of Mauna Kea. The twin 10-meter Keck Telescopes are the most powerful visible and infrared eyes on earth.

W.M. Keck Observatory

Keck All-sky Adaptive Optics (KAPA)

W.M. Keck Observatory recently started the upgrade of their laser system to provide laser tomography adaptive optics to improve the performance of the K1 telescope.

UCO / LAO

REDWOODS

REDWOODS is a new sub-testbed within the Shane Adaptive Optics (AO) system at Lick Observatory, developed to test second stage AO wavefront sensing and control technologies, including a Self-Coherent Camera with optional broadband Wynne corrector, two different three-sided fully reflective highly broadband pyramid wavefront sensor modes, and multi-wavefront sensor single conjugate AO control.

LAO / UCSC

UC Santa Cruz Extreme AO Lab (SEAL)

The Santa Cruz Extreme AO Lab (SEAL) is a visible-wavelength testbed designed to advance the state of the art in wavefront control for high contrast imaging on large, segmented, ground-based telescopes. SEAL provides multiple options for simulating atmospheric turbulence, including rotating phase plates and a custom Meadowlark spatial light modulator delivering phase offsets of up to 6π at 635 nm.

CNRS / LAM · INAF / OAPD

Observatoire de Haute Provence — PAPYRUS

PAPYRUS is an adaptive optics bench on the 1.52 m telescope T152 at Observatoire de Haute Provence (France) since June 2022, designed for R&D and educational purposes. It is evolving towards an instrumental platform — including infrared capabilities — to mature concepts for future systems such as the 2.5 m PROVIDENCE system and the HARMONI instrument at ELT. PAPYRUS features a four-sided pyramid wavefront sensor with an EMCCD camera and a 241-actuator deformable mirror.

Bertin Alpao

AOB-WAN

Adaptive Optics Bench for Wide and Narrow fields.

Durham University

Durham Adaptive Optics (DAO)

DAO is a powerful and flexible software solution for adaptive optics systems, enabling real-time correction of wavefront distortions caused by atmospheric turbulence and optical aberrations. DAO takes a hardware-agnostic approach to processing pipelines, supporting distributed heterogeneous compute environments and seamless integration with various wavefront sensors, actuators, and other components.

Université de Genève

RISTRETTO

RISTRETTO is an instrumental project to detect the reflected light of nearby exoplanets using the spectroscopic coronagraphy technique. Once ready, this instrument will be proposed as a visitor instrument for the ESO VLT facility. Wakea Consulting is involved in the development of its adaptive optics Real-Time Computer (RTC).

Software & Control for Astronomy and Adaptive Optics