Related papers: Performance characterization of a broadband vector…
In recent years, phase mask coronagraphy has become increasingly efficient in imaging the close environment of stars, enabling the search for exoplanets and circumstellar disks. Coronagraphs are ideally suited instruments, characterized by…
Current state-of-the-art high contrast imaging instruments take advantage of a number of elegant coronagraph designs to suppress starlight and image nearby faint objects, such as exoplanets and circumstellar disks. The ideal performance and…
This study is focused on the very high dynamic imaging field, specifically the direct observation of exoplanetary systems. The coronagraph is an essential technique for suppressing the star's light, making it possible to detect an exoplanet…
The future Habitable Worlds Observatory aims to characterize the atmospheres of rocky exoplanets around solar-type stars. The vector vortex coronagraph (VVC) is a main candidate to reach the required contrast of $10^{-10}$. However, the VVC…
The band-limited coronagraph is a nearly ideal concept that theoretically enables perfect cancellation of all the light of an on-axis source. Over the past years, several prototypes have been developed and tested in the laboratory, and more…
The specification of polishing requirements for the optics in coronagraphs dedicated to exo-planet detection requires careful and accurate optical modelling. Numerical representations of the propagation of aberrations through the system as…
The current generation of ground-based coronagraphic instruments uses deformable mirrors to correct for phase errors and to improve contrast levels at small angular separations. Improving these techniques, several space and ground based…
Context. In the context of direct imaging of exoplanets, coronagraphs are commonly proposed to reach the required very high contrast levels. However, wavefront aberrations induce speckles in their focal plane and limit their performance.…
The WFIRST-AFTA 2.4 m telescope will provide in the next decade the opportunity to host a coronagraph for the imaging and spectroscopy of planets and disks. The telescope, however, is not ideal, given its obscured aperture. Only recently…
High-contrast imaging provided by a coronagraph is critical for the direction imaging of the Earth-like planet orbiting its bright parent star. A major limitation for such direct imaging is the speckle noise that is induced from the…
The unparalleled theoretical performance of an ideal vector vortex coronagraph makes it one of the most promising technologies for directly imaging exoplanets with a future, off-axis space telescope. However, the image contrast required for…
We present the final results of the Apodized Pupil Lyot Coronagraph (APLC) on the High-contrast imager for Complex Aperture Telescopes (HiCAT) testbed, under NASA's Strategic Astrophysics Technology program. The HiCAT testbed was developed…
Potentially habitable planets around nearby stars less massive than solar-type stars could join targets of the spectroscopy of the planetary reflected light with future space telescopes. However, the orbits of most of these planets occur…
Coronagraph instruments on future space telescopes will enable the direct detection and characterization of Earth-like exoplanets around Sun-like stars for the first time. The quest for the optimal optical coronagraph designs has made rapid…
Two high performance coronagraphic approaches compatible with segmented and obstructed telescope pupils are described. Both concepts use entrance pupil amplitude apodization and a combined phase and amplitude focal plane mask to achieve…
A coronagraphic starlight suppression system situated on a future flagship space observatory offers a promising avenue to image Earth-like exoplanets and search for biomarkers in their atmospheric spectra. One NASA mission concept that…
We have designed and built the first band-limited coronagraphic mask used for ground-based high-contrast imaging observations. The mask resides in the focal plane of the near-infrared camera PHARO at the Palomar Hale telescope and receives…
Phase-Induced Amplitude Apodization Complex Mask Coronagraphs (PIAACMC) offer high-contrast performance at a small inner-working angle ($\approx$ 1 $\lambda$/D) with high planet throughput ($>$ 70%). The complex mask is a multi-zone,…
The Apodized Pupil Lyot Coronagraph (APLC) is a promising coronagraphic device for direct exoplanets detection on the European-Extremely Large Telescope. We present new near-IR laboratory results using binary apodizers -- the so-called…
We discuss the use of parametric phase-diverse phase retrieval as an in-situ high-fidelity wavefront measurement method to characterize and optimize the transmitted wavefront of a high-contrast coronagraphic instrument. We apply our method…