Title: Detecting Exoplanets with a Liquid-Crystal-Based Vortex Coronagraph
Abstract: Planets beyond our own solar system are difficult to image directly because of their proximity to significantly brighter stars. In order to suppress the intense starlight, a high-performance optical coronagraph is required, and the optical vortex coronagraph can in theory enable observations very close to stars. The vortex phase masks needed to implement this approach have been manufactured as circularly symmetric half-wave plates made of liquid crystal polymers, and initial on-sky tests have been carried out. This approach has in fact already allowed the successful detection of exoplanets as close as two diffraction beam widths from a bright star, at contrasts of approximately 10−5. Significantly improved performance should be possible in the near future.
Publication Year: 2012
Publication Date: 2012-07-19
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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