Can adaptive optics improve the images from a mid-latitude observatory?
To some extent yes, but you will always win by starting with better natural seeing. Adaptive optics is a technique for cancelling out atmospheric turbulence by using deformable mirrors (i.e., mirrors that can change shape hundreds of times per second to compensate for the atmosphere). Adaptive optics allows you to extract the maximum performance from a given observing site. However, the technique has a number of problems: it only sharpens the image in the immediate vicinity of reference star(s) or laser beam(s), it is largely limited to infrared wavelengths, it leads to errors in measuring the brightness of stars, and it is very expensive. There are no realistic prospects for achieving significant adaptive optics correction at visible wavelengths at mid-latitude observatories.
