In recent years, new coronagraphic schemes have been proposed, the most promising being the optical vortex phase mask coronagraphs. In our work, a new scheme of broadband optical scalar vortex coronagraph is proposed and characterized experimentally in the laboratory. Our setup employs a pair of computer generated phase gratings (one of them containing a singularity) to control the chromatic dispersion of phase plates and achieves a constant peak-to-peak attenuation below 1:1000 over a bandwidth of 120 nm centered at 700 nm. An inner working angle of λ/D is demonstrated along with a raw contrast of 11.5magnitudes at 2λ/D. A more compact setup achieves a peak-to-peak attenuation below 1:1000 over a bandwidth of 60 nm with the other results remaining the same.

Date Published: 18 July 2014
PDF: 7 pages
Proc. SPIE 9151, Advances in Optical and Mechanical Technologies for Telescopes and Instrumentation, 91515M (18 July 2014); doi: 10.1117/12.2054875

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9151:
Advances in Optical and Mechanical Technologies for Telescopes and Instrumentation
Ramón Navarro; Colin R. Cunningham; Allison A. Barto, Editor(s)