Fundamental limitations on Earth-like planet detection with Extremely Large Telescopes

Details Fundamental limitations on Earth-like planet detection with Extremely Large Telescopes Fundamental limitations on Earth-like planet detection with Extremely Large Telescopes

2005-09-23

arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0509713v1

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

8 pages, 8 figures, accepted in A&A

Scientific paper

10.1051/0004-6361:20053916

We analyse the fundamental limitations for the detection of extraterrestrial planets with Extremely Large Telescopes. For this task, a coronagraphic device combined to a very high order wavefront correction system is required but not sufficient to achieve the $10^{-10}$ contrast level needed for detecting an Earth-like planet. The stellar residuals left uncorrected by the wavefront correction system need to be calibrated and subtracted. In this paper, we consider a general model including the dynamic phase aberrations downstream the wavefront correction system, the static phase aberrations of the instrument and some differential aberrations provided by the calibration unit. A rather optimistic case of a filled circular pupil and of a perfect coronagraph is elsewhere assumed. As a result of the analytical study, the limitation mostly comes from the static aberrations. Using numerical simulations we confirm this result and evaluate the requirements in terms of phase aberrations to detect Earth-like planets on Extremely Large Telescopes.

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