Seidr update: photonic 'black magic' for high-contrast interferometry using kernel-nulling and photonic lanterns
Abstract
Seidr is a new interferometric beam combiner within the Asgard Suite, utilizing infrastructure common to the Bifrost instrument at the Very Large Telescope Interferometer. Seidr combines hybrid mode-selective photonic lantern injection modules with a kernel-nulling photonic chip backend to enable deep H-band nulling for high-contrast studies of exoplanets, exomoons, and exo-zodiacal dust. This instrument update summarizes Seidr's current design maturity and recent simulations of the point source-to-lantern outputs. We also outline progress on our neural network-based wavefront estimation scheme, which uses the photonic lantern outputs to sense phase fluctuations, designed to feed back to Baldr's deformable mirror, and improve nuller light injection.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2607.03280,
title = {Seidr update: photonic 'black magic' for high-contrast interferometry using kernel-nulling and photonic lanterns},
author = {Nathan K Long and Daniel S Dahl and Christopher H Betters and Julia J Bryant and Nick Cvetojevic and Michael J Ireland and Stefan Kraus and Sergio Leon-Saval and Frantz Martinache and Marc-Antoine Martinod and Barnaby Norris and Jyotirmay Paul and Akira Rodziewicz-Ryan and Adam K Taras and Jin Wei and Peter G Tuthill},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2607.03280},
year = {2026}
}