Wavefront Sensing in Space: Flight Demonstration II of the PICTURE Sounding Rocket Payload

Abstract

A NASA sounding rocket for high-contrast imaging with a visible nulling coronagraph, the PICTURE payload, has made two suborbital attempts to observe the warm dust disk inferred around Epsilon Eridani. The first flight in 2011 demonstrated a 5 milliarcsecond fine pointing system in space. The reduced flight data from the second launch, on 25 November 2015, presented herein, demonstrate active sensing of wavefront phase in space. Despite several anomalies in flight, post-facto reduction phase stepping interferometer data provides insight into the wavefront sensing precision and the system stability for a portion of the pupil. These measurements show the actuation of a 32$\times$32-actuator microelectromechanical system deformable mirror. The wavefront sensor reached a median precision of 1.4 nanometers per pixel, with 95% of samples between 0.8 and 12.0 nanometers per pixel. The median system stability, including telescope and coronagraph wavefront errors other than tip, tilt, and piston, was 3.6 nanometers per pixel, with 95% of samples between 1.2 and 23.7 nanometers per pixel.

arXiv comment23 pages, 8 figures, JATIS accepted

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Cited by in corpus (4)

• The Habitable Exoplanet Observatory (HabEx) Mission Concept Study Interim Report
• Design of the vacuum high contrast imaging testbed for CDEEP, the Coronagraphic Debris and Exoplanet Exploring Pioneer
• Approaches to lowering the cost of large space telescopes
• Demonstration of magnetic and light-controlled actuation of a photomagnetically actuated deformable mirror for wavefront control