Planet detection in visible light with a single aperture telescope and nulling coronagraph

B. Martin Levine; Michael Shao; Duncan T. Liu; James K. Wallace; Benjamin F. Lane

doi:10.1117/12.507807

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19 November 2003 Planet detection in visible light with a single aperture telescope and nulling coronagraph

B. Martin Levine, Michael Shao, Duncan T. Liu, James K. Wallace, Benjamin F. Lane

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Proceedings Volume 5170, Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets; (2003) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.507807
Event: Optical Science and Technology, SPIE's 48th Annual Meeting, 2003, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

This paper describes the latest progress for visible direct detection of Earth like extrasolar planets using a nulling coronagraph instrument behind a 4m class telescope. Such a system is capable of satisfying the scientific objectives of the Terrestrial Planet Finder mission In our design, a 4 beam nulling interferometer is synthesized from the telescope pupil, producing a very deep null proportional to θ⁴ which is then filtered by a coherent array of single mode fibers to suppress the residual scattered light. With diffraction limited telescope optics and similar quality components in the optical train (λ/20), suppression of the starlight to 10^-10 is achievable. Such a telescope with this nulling interferometer as back-end instrument can image and detect planets, or provide the input to a low resolution spectrometer. Shown are key features of this system in a space mission, latest results of laboratory measurements demonstrating achievable null depth, and progress toward fabrication of coherent single mode fiber arrays.

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B. Martin Levine, Michael Shao, Duncan T. Liu, James K. Wallace, and Benjamin F. Lane "Planet detection in visible light with a single aperture telescope and nulling coronagraph", Proc. SPIE 5170, Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets, (19 November 2003); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.507807

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