Related papers: Performance characterization of a broadband vector…
The Phase-Induced Amplitude Apodization (PIAA) coronagraph is a high performance coronagraph concept able to work at small angular separation with little loss in throughput. We present results obtained with a laboratory PIAA system…
Specific high contrast imaging instruments are mandatory to characterize circumstellar disks and exoplanets around nearby stars. Coronagraphs are commonly used in these facilities to reject the diffracted light of an observed star and…
Stellar coronagraph performance is highly sensitive to optical aberrations. In order to effectively suppress starlight for exoplanet imaging applications, low-order wavefront aberrations entering a coronagraph such as tip-tilt, defocus and…
A high contrast coronagraph is expected to provide one of the promising ways to directly observe extra-solar planets. We present the newest results of our laboratory experiment investigating "rigid" coronagraph with a binary shaped…
Broadband coronagraphy with deep nulling and small inner working angle has the potential of delivering images and spectra of exoplanets and other faint objects. In recent years, many coronagraphic schemes have been proposed, the most…
Several recent designs for planet-finding telescopes use coronagraphs operating at visible wavelengths to suppress starlight along the telescope's optical axis while transmitting any off-axis light from circumstellar material. We describe a…
The apodized-pupil Lyot coronagraph is one of the most advanced starlight cancellation concepts studied intensively in the past few years. Extreme adaptive optics instruments built for present-day 8m class telescopes will operate with such…
In the context of high contrast imaging, we propose to evaluate the performance of the Apodized Pupil Lyot Coronagraph (APLC) working without Lyot Stop, namely Stop-less Lyot Coronagraph (SLLC). This coronagraph is a combination of an…
The evanescent wave coronagraph uses the principle of frustrated total internal reflection (FTIR) to suppress the light coming from the star and study its close environment. Its focal plane mask is composed of a lens and a prism placed in…
Telescope pupil fragmentation from spiders generates specific aberrations observed at various telescopes and expected on the large telescopes under construction. This so-called island effect induces differential pistons, tips and tilts on…
The continual push to directly image exoplanets at lower masses and closer separations orbiting around bright stars remains limited by both quasi-static and residual adaptive optics (AO) aberration. In previous papers we have proposed a…
Direct imaging of exoplanets or circumstellar disk material requires extreme contrast at the 10-6 to 10-12 levels at < 100 mas angular separation from the star. Focal-plane mask (FPM) coronagraphic imaging has played a key role in this…
The Exo-Planet Imaging Camera and Spectrograph (EPICS) for the future 42-meter European-Extremely Large Telescope, will enable direct images, and spectra for both young and old Jupiter-mass planets in the infrared. To achieve the required…
Advancing the technological development of small inner working angle (IWA) coronagraphs is essential to enabling high-contrast imaging of temperate exoplanets with future extremely large telescopes. The PIAACMC has been shown to closely…
We describe a new instrument that forms the core of a long-term high contrast imaging program at the 200-inch Hale Telescope at Palomar Observatory. The primary scientific thrust is to obtain images and low-resolution spectroscopy of brown…
Vortex coronagraphs are an attractive solution for imaging exoplanets with future space telescopes due to their relatively high throughput, large spectral bandwidth, and low sensitivity to low-order aberrations compared to other…
Directly imaging and characterizing Earth-like exoplanets is a tremendously difficult instrumental challenge. Present coronagraphic systems have yet to achieve the required $10^{-10}$ broadband contrast in a laboratory environment, but…
The Apodized Pupil Lyot Coronagraph (APLC) is a diffraction suppression system installed in the recently deployed instruments Palomar/P1640, Gemini/GPI, and VLT/SPHERE to allow direct imaging and spectroscopy of circumstellar environments.…
Modern coronagraph design relies on advanced, large-scale optimization processes that require an ever increasing amount of computational resources. In this paper, we restrict ourselves to the design of Apodized Pupil Lyot Coronagraphs…
Coronagraphic techniques are required to detect exoplanets with future Extremely Large Telescopes. One concept, the Apodized Pupil Lyot Coronagraph (APLC), is combining an apodizer in the entrance aperture and a Lyot opaque mask in the…