A dispersed heterodyne design for the Planet Formation Imager

Michael J. Ireland, John D. Monnier

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

    22 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    The Planet Formation Imager (PFI) is a future world facility that will image the process of planetary formation. It will have an angular resolution and sensitivity sufficient to resolve sub-Hill sphere structures around newly formed giant planets orbiting solar-type stars in nearby star formation regions. We present one concept for this design consisting of twenty-seven or more 4m telescopes with kilometric baselines feeding a mid-infrared spectrograph where starlight is mixed with a frequency-comb laser. Fringe tracking will be undertaken in H-band using a fiber-fed direct detection interferometer, meaning that all beam transport is done by communications band fibers. Although heterodyne interferometry typically has lower signal-to-noise than direct detection interferometry, it has an advantage for imaging fields of view with many resolution elements, because the signal in direct detection has to be split many ways while the signal in heterodyne interferometry can be amplified prior to combining every baseline pair. We compare the performance and cost envelope of this design to a comparable direct-detection design.

    Original languageEnglish
    Title of host publicationOptical and Infrared Interferometry IV
    EditorsJayadev K. Rajagopal, Michelle J. Creech-Eakman, Fabien Malbet
    PublisherSPIE
    ISBN (Electronic)9780819496140
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2014
    EventOptical and Infrared Interferometry IV - Montreal, Canada
    Duration: 23 Jun 201427 Jun 2014

    Publication series

    NameProceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering
    Volume9146
    ISSN (Print)0277-786X
    ISSN (Electronic)1996-756X

    Conference

    ConferenceOptical and Infrared Interferometry IV
    Country/TerritoryCanada
    CityMontreal
    Period23/06/1427/06/14

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