DARWIN NULLING INTERFEROMETER BREADBOARD Ⅰ: SYSTEM ENGINEERING AND MEASUREMENTS

摘要

The presented work has been funded by ESA under ESTEC/Contract No. 14827/00/NL/CK and Astrium Germany has been awarded with this first ESA breadboarding towards nulling interferometry. Astrium designed and manufactured a nulling breadboard operating in the near infrared. The selected concept is fully transferable to the mid infrared. The interferometer is based on a highly symmetric Sagnac core. A dispersive phase shifter or a periscope system maintains the required phase shift of π. Two different source simulators have been built to test the interferometer's performance. They provide two point sources simulating a typical star and a planet signal. Angular separation of the point sources and intensity can be adapted to both operation modes, nulling and imaging. The OPD is actively stabilized to a gray fringe at a shorter wavelength without wobbling the system's OPD. The best results obtained with a diode laser source were a star suppression of 408,000 and a suppression of 32,000 using a broad-band ASE source. A stable deep null with a star suppression of 50,000 to 70,000 could be achieved over half an hour.