New Worlds Observer

In winter of 2005/2006 I helped build a ground-based proof of concept experiment for a novel planet-finding technology. A star shade is used to suppress starlight in order to take photos and measure spectra of earth-like planets orbiting other star systems. The star shade must suppress the starlight by a factor of 1 billion in order to see a small, dim terrestrial planet at a sun-earth distance from the star. This photo is of the detector at the end of a 140-foot dark tunnel. It is measuring the amount of sunlight being occulted by the star shade.

This is the redesigned detector and light trap assembly for vacuum testing to eliminate airglow. The tests were performed at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)’s Vacuum Tunnel Facility (NVTF).

This is one of the star shades being tested. It is 2” in diameter, strung on three strands of 80-micron nickel chromium wire. The petals allow passing light to destructively interfere with itself, deepening the shadow where planets can be seen.

This is one of two demos I made of the basic science behind the star shade concept, to be shown at conferences. It is roughly 4 feet long. The door at the right allows easy access for swapping inner pieces, and is closed with Velcro creating a dark space within. The viewer looks through the hole on the left end of the tube at a 1-cm diameter star shade halfway down, which blocks light from a very bright tactical flashlight at the other end of the tube. The star shade can be switched with a circular disc to demonstrate the difference in light suppression.

I used skills from my art degree to design a website for the New Worlds Observer. Its address is http://newworlds.colorado.edu