4,689 research outputs found
Pupil remapping for high contrast astronomy: results from an optical testbed
The direct imaging and characterization of Earth-like planets is among the
most sought-after prizes in contemporary astrophysics, however current optical
instrumentation delivers insufficient dynamic range to overcome the vast
contrast differential between the planet and its host star. New opportunities
are offered by coherent single mode fibers, whose technological development has
been motivated by the needs of the telecom industry in the near infrared. This
paper presents a new vision for an instrument using coherent waveguides to
remap the pupil geometry of the telescope. It would (i) inject the full pupil
of the telescope into an array of single mode fibers, (ii) rearrange the pupil
so fringes can be accurately measured, and (iii) permit image reconstruction so
that atmospheric blurring can be totally removed. Here we present a laboratory
experiment whose goal was to validate the theoretical concepts underpinning our
proposed method. We successfully confirmed that we can retrieve the image of a
simulated astrophysical object (in this case a binary star) though a pupil
remapping instrument using single mode fibers.Comment: Accepted in Optics Expres
High dynamic range imaging with a single-mode pupil remapping system : a self-calibration algorithm for redundant interferometric arrays
The correction of the influence of phase corrugation in the pupil plane is a
fundamental issue in achieving high dynamic range imaging. In this paper, we
investigate an instrumental setup which consists in applying interferometric
techniques on a single telescope, by filtering and dividing the pupil with an
array of single-mode fibers. We developed a new algorithm, which makes use of
the fact that we have a redundant interferometric array, to completely
disentangle the astronomical object from the atmospheric perturbations (phase
and scintillation). This self-calibrating algorithm can also be applied to any
- diluted or not - redundant interferometric setup. On an 8 meter telescope
observing at a wavelength of 630 nm, our simulations show that a single mode
pupil remapping system could achieve, at a few resolution elements from the
central star, a raw dynamic range up to 10^6; depending on the brightness of
the source. The self calibration algorithm proved to be very efficient,
allowing image reconstruction of faint sources (mag = 15) even though the
signal-to-noise ratio of individual spatial frequencies are of the order of
0.1. We finally note that the instrument could be more sensitive by combining
this setup with an adaptive optics system. The dynamic range would however be
limited by the noise of the small, high frequency, displacements of the
deformable mirror.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRA
Chiral effective field theory for nuclear matter
We report on the recent developments of a new effective field theory for
nuclear matter [1,2,3]. We present first the nuclear matter chiral power
counting that takes into account both short-- and long--range inter-nucleon
interactions. It also identifies non-perturbative strings of diagrams, related
to the iteration of nucleon-nucleon interactions, which have to be re-summed.
The methods of unitary chiral perturbation theory has been shown to be a useful
tool in order to perform those resummations. Results up to next-to-leading
order for the ground state energy per particle of nuclear matter, the in-medium
chiral quark condensate and pion self-energy are discussed.Comment: Plenary talk at Chiral10 WORKSHOP, 21-24 Jun 2010, Valencia, Spai
The chiral quark condensate and pion decay constant in nuclear matter at next-to-leading order
Making use of the recently developed chiral power counting for the physics of
nuclear matter [1,2], we evaluate the in-medium chiral quark condensate up to
next-to-leading order for both symmetric nuclear matter and neutron matter. Our
calculation includes the full in-medium iteration of the leading order local
and one-pion exchange nucleon-nucleon interactions. Interestingly, we find a
cancellation between the contributions stemming from the quark mass dependence
of the nucleon mass appearing in the in-medium nucleon-nucleon interactions.
Only the contributions originating from the explicit quark mass dependence of
the pion mass survive. This cancellation is the reason of previous observations
concerning the dominant role of the long-range pion contributions and the
suppression of short-range nucleon-nucleon interactions. We find that the
linear density contribution to the in-medium chiral quark condensate is only
slightly modified for pure neutron matter by the nucleon-nucleon interactions.
For symmetric nuclear matter the in-medium corrections are larger, although
smaller compared to other approaches due to the full iteration of the lowest
order nucleon-nucleon tree-level amplitudes. Our calculation satisfies the
Hellmann-Feynman theorem to the order worked out. Also we address the problem
of calculating the leading in-medium corrections to the pion decay constant. We
find that there are no extra in-medium corrections that violate the
Gell-Mann-Oakes-Renner relation up to next-to-leading order.Comment: 21 pages, 9 figure
CubeSats as pathfinders for planetary detection: the FIRST-S satellite
The idea behind FIRST (Fibered Imager foR a Single Telescope) is to use
single-mode fibers to combine multiple apertures in a pupil plane as such as to
synthesize a bigger aperture. The advantages with respect to a pure imager are
i) relaxed tolerance on the pointing and cophasing, ii) higher accuracy in
phase measurement, and iii) availability of compact, precise, and active
single-mode optics like Lithium Niobate. The latter point being a huge asset in
the context of a space mission. One of the problems of DARWIN or SIM-like
projects was the difficulty to find low cost pathfinders missions. But the fact
that Lithium Niobate optic is small and compact makes it easy to test through
small nanosats missions. Moreover, they are commonly used in the telecom
industry, and have already been tested on communication satellites. The idea of
the FIRST-S demonstrator is to spatialize a 3U CubeSat with a Lithium Niobate
nulling interferometer. The technical challenges of the project are: star
tracking, beam combination, and nulling capabilities. The optical baseline of
the interferometer would be 30 cm, giving a 2.2 AU spatial resolution at
distance of 10 pc. The scientific objective of this mission would be to study
the visible emission of exozodiacal light in the habitable zone around the
closest stars.Comment: SPIE 2014 -- Astronomical telescopes and instrumentation -- Montrea
Switching the magnetic configuration of a spin valve by current induced domain wall motion
We present experimental results on the displacement of a domain wall by
injection of a dc current through the wall. The samples are 1 micron wide long
stripes of a CoO/Co/Cu/NiFe classical spin valve structure.
The stripes have been patterned by electron beam lithography. A neck has been
defined at 1/3 of the total length of the stripe and is a pinning center for
the domain walls, as shown by the steps of the giant magnetoresistance curves
at intermediate levels (1/3 or 2/3) between the resistances corresponding to
the parallel and antiparallel configurations. We show by electric transport
measurements that, once a wall is trapped, it can be moved by injecting a dc
current higher than a threshold current of the order of magnitude of 10^7
A/cm^2. We discuss the different possible origins of this effect, i.e. local
magnetic field created by the current and/or spin transfer from spin polarized
current.Comment: 3 pages, 3 figure
High resolution imaging of young M-type stars of the solar neighborhood: Probing the existence of companions down to the mass of Jupiter
Context. High contrast imaging is a powerful technique to search for gas
giant planets and brown dwarfs orbiting at separation larger than several AU.
Around solar-type stars, giant planets are expected to form by core accretion
or by gravitational instability, but since core accretion is increasingly
difficult as the primary star becomes lighter, gravitational instability would
be the a probable formation scenario for yet-to-be-found distant giant planets
around a low-mass star. A systematic survey for such planets around M dwarfs
would therefore provide a direct test of the efficiency of gravitational
instability. Aims. We search for gas giant planets orbiting around late-type
stars and brown dwarfs of the solar neighborhood. Methods. We obtained deep
high resolution images of 16 targets with the adaptive optic system of VLT-NACO
in the Lp band, using direct imaging and angular differential imaging. This is
currently the largest and deepest survey for Jupiter-mass planets around
Mdwarfs. We developed and used an integrated reduction and analysis pipeline to
reduce the images and derive our 2D detection limits for each target. The
typical contrast achieved is about 9 magnitudes at 0.5" and 11 magnitudes
beyond 1". For each target we also determine the probability of detecting a
planet of a given mass at a given separation in our images. Results. We derived
accurate detection probabilities for planetary companions, taking into account
orbital projection effects, with in average more than 50% probability to detect
a 3MJup companion at 10AU and a 1.5MJup companion at 20AU, bringing strong
constraints on the existence of Jupiter-mass planets around this sample of
young M-dwarfs.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&
- …