Nondimensional representations for occulter design and performance evaluation

Eric Cady

doi:10.1117/12.892742

15 September 2011 Nondimensional representations for occulter design and performance evaluation

Eric Cady

Proceedings Volume 8151, Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets V; 815112 (2011) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.892742
Event: SPIE Optical Engineering + Applications, 2011, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

An occulter is a spacecraft with a precisely-shaped optical edges which flies in formation with a telescope, blocking light from a star while leaving light from nearby planets unaffected. Using linear optimization, occulters can be designed for use with telescopes over a wide range of telescope aperture sizes, science bands, and starlight suppression levels. It can be shown that this optimization depends primarily on a small number of independent nondimensional parameters, which correspond to Fresnel numbers and physical scales and enter the optimization only as constraints. We show how these can be used to span the parameter space of possible optimized occulters; this data set can then be mined to determine occulter sizes for various mission scenarios and sets of engineering constraints.

Citation Download Citation

Eric Cady "Nondimensional representations for occulter design and performance evaluation", Proc. SPIE 8151, Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets V, 815112 (15 September 2011); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.892742

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