Beam transport for the TPF interferometer

Martin Charles Noecker; James W. Leitch

doi:10.1117/12.620314

14 September 2005 Beam transport for the TPF interferometer

Proceedings Volume 5905, Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets II; 590504 (2005) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.620314
Event: Optics and Photonics 2005, 2005, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

The Terrestrial Planet Finder Interferometer (TPF-I) is a future NASA mission for mid-infrared astronomy in space, using formation flying to position the telescopes. A unique and significant challenge for TPF-I is control of stray light from thermally emitting objects near the starlight beam paths, such as sunshades and other warm parts of the neighboring spacecraft. A proposed strategy for stray light control in these missions is simple geometric shading of the beam-transport optics from the emitting objects, but this intrinsically limits the maximum inter-spacecraft separation. We present a preliminary study of diffractive beam propagation to set lower limits on the baffle diameters. This and other geometric constraints then lead to specific estimates of the maximum inter-spacecraft separation.

Citation Download Citation

Martin Charles Noecker and James W. Leitch "Beam transport for the TPF interferometer", Proc. SPIE 5905, Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets II, 590504 (14 September 2005); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.620314

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