Sympathy for the nulling

François Hénault; Laura Schreiber

doi:10.1117/12.3014223

23 August 2024 Sympathy for the nulling

François Hénault, Laura Schreiber

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 13092, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2024: Optical, Infrared, and Millimeter Wave; 130925W (2024) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3014223
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2024, Yokohama, Japan

Conference Poster

Abstract

Space borne nulling interferometry in the mid-infrared waveband is one of the most promising techniques for discovering life markers in the atmosphere of Earth-like extra-solar planets. One of its main difficulties is to control freeflying telescope spacecrafts orbiting around a central combiner within accuracy better than one milometer typically. Moreover, the whole array must be reconfigured regularly in order to observing different planetary systems, thus increasing the risk of loosing one or more spacecrafts and aborting the mission before its end. In this paper is described a simplified optical configuration based on non-rotating, tip-tilted telescopes arranged along a linear array. The central combiner is made of a compact integrated optics chip located close to the detection plane. In that way the necessary number of array reconfigurations is limited and still allows efficient modulation of the planet signal. This leads to considerable simplification with respect to conventional nulling interferometer designs. Numerical simulations confirm that typical contrasts about 10-6 are achievable.

(2024) Published by SPIE. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.

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François Hénault and Laura Schreiber "Sympathy for the nulling", Proc. SPIE 13092, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2024: Optical, Infrared, and Millimeter Wave, 130925W (23 August 2024); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3014223

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