Detecting and characterizing close-in exoplanets with vortex fiber nulling
Abstract
Vortex Fiber Nulling (VFN) is an interferometric method for suppressing starlight to detect and spectroscopically characterize exoplanets. It relies on a vortex phase mask and single-mode fiber to reject starlight while simultaneously coupling up to 20% of the planet light at separations of ≾ 1λ/D, thereby enabling spectroscopic characterization of a large population of RV and transit-detected planets, among others, that are inaccessible to conventional coronagraphs. VFN has been demonstrated in the lab at visible wavelengths and here we present the latest results of these experiments. This includes polychromatic nulls of 5 10⁻⁴ in 10% bandwidth light centered around 790 nm. An upgraded testbed has been designed and is being built in the lab now; we also present a status update on that work here. Finally, we present preliminary K-band (2 micron) fiber nulling results with the infrared mask that will be used on-sky as part of a VFN mode for the Keck Planet Imager and Characterizer Instrument in 2021.
Additional Information
© 2020 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Daniel Echeverri is supported by a NASA Future Investigators in NASA Earth and Space Science and Technology (FINESST) fellowship under award #80NSSC19K1423. This work was supported by the Heising-Simons Foundation through grants #2019-1312 and #2015-129. Part of this research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (80NM0018D0004). The authors wish to recognize and acknowledge the very significant cultural role and reverence that the summit of Maunakea has always had within the indigenous Hawaiian community. We are most fortunate to have the opportunity to conduct observations from this mountain.Attached Files
Published - 1144619.pdf
Submitted - 2012.04239.pdf
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Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 107248
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20201222-074738306
- NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship
- 80NSSC19K1423
- Heising-Simons Foundation
- 2019-1312
- Heising-Simons Foundation
- 2015-129
- NASA/JPL/Caltech
- NASA
- 80NM0018D0004
- Created
-
2020-12-22Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
-
2021-11-16Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Caltech groups
- Astronomy Department
- Series Name
- Proceedings of SPIE
- Series Volume or Issue Number
- 11446