10/02/2023
By Lynne Schaufenbil
Guangfeng Yu will present his MS Thesis Defense in Physics entitled "Monolithic Achromatic Nulling Interferometric Corograph Contrast Measurement" at 10 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 12 in WAN405.
Committee members:
- Timothy Cook
- Christopher Mendillo
- Viktor Podolskiy
Title: Monolithic Achromatic Nulling Interferometric Corograph Contrast Measurement
Abstract: Monolithic Achromatic Nulling Interferometric Coronagraph, or MANIC is a space-based nulling optic designed by scientists from Lowell Center for Space Science and Technology to be used for direct exoplanets detection. Previous theoretical simulation predicts that the level of nulling MANIC can achieve will be In the order of -6. In this thesis we present the result from the contrast measurement we perform with the MANIC instrument. An optical setup that incorporates a coherent wavefront sensing correction is built to perform the contrast measurement. We want to examine how much raw contrast we can achieve and if we can measure an order of contrast that matches the theoretical prediction. In the end we were able to measure the order of contrast to be –2.2. A discussion on the limit of our current optical setup and what future changes can be made to improve our measurement results is provided.