Exploring the Cosmos: Enabling One Thousand Times More Sensitive Spectrographs for Exoplanet Search

Executive Summary

We will experimentally demonstrate a technique to stabilize an optical dispersive spectrograph against unwanted wavelength drifts by adding an interferometer to its input beam and processing the spectral data using a novel technique known as crossfading externally dispersed interferometry, which is expected to increase spectrograph stability by up to one thousand times. Since uncontrolled wavelength drifts are often the major limitation of a spectrograph's precision, this technique will increase the Doppler velocity precision for characterizing Earthlike exoplanets, while also increasing the robustness and accuracy of airborne or spaceborne spectrographs.

Publications, Presentations, and Patents

Erskine, David J. 2022. "Spectrograph Stabilization Using a Single-delay Interferometer." Record of invention IL-13759. July 27, 2022.

Erskine, David J. and Jerry Edelstein. 2022. "Externally Dispersed Interferometry for Characterizing High Resolution Spectrographs." Record of invention IL-unassigned. August 18, 2022.

Erskine, David J., Edward Wishnow, Eric Linder, Erik J. Davies, Martin Sirk, Richard Ozer, Dayne Fratanduono and Jerry Edelstein. 2022. “Spectrograph Stabilization of 500x Using a Single-delay Interferometer.” SPIE 12184: paper#169. IM-1055096, LLNL-PROC-835920.

Erskine, David J., Jerry Edelstein, Edward Wishnow, Erik J. Davies, Martin Sirk, Richard Ozer, and Dayne Fratanduono. 2022. "Externally Dispersed Interferometer Testbed Diagnosing Keck Planet Finder Spectrograph High Resolution Performance." SPIE 12184: paper# 165. IM-1055552, LLNL-PROC-836395.

Erskine, David J., and Dayne E. Fratanduono. “Enabling 1000x More Sensitive Spectrographs for Exoplanet Search.” Am. Geophys. Union Fall Meeting: session U43B, paper# 8. December 2021. IM-1039082, LLNL-ABS-825147.

Erskine, David J., Edward Wishnow, Erik Davies, Martin Sirk, Richard Ozer, Eric Linder, Dayne Fratanduono, and Jerry Edelstein. "Crossfaded Externally Dispersed Interferometer Testbed for 1000x Improved Doppler Spectrograph Stability." AASTCS: 9, Poster# 102.169. May 2022. IM-1051954, LLNL-POST-833692.

Erskine, David J., Edward Wishnow, Eric Linder, Erik Davies, Martin Sirk, Richard Ozer, Dayne Fratanduono and Jerry Edelstein. “Spectrograph Stabilization of 500x using a Single-delay Interferometer.” SPIE 12184: poster# 169. https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2628388. 2022. IM-1055004, LLNL-POST-835921.

Erskine, David J., Jerry Edelstein, Edward Wishnow, Erik J. Davies, Martin Sirk, Richard Ozer, and Dayne Fratanduono."Externally Dispersed Interferometer Testbed Diagnosing Keck Planet Finder Spectrograph High Resolution Performance." SPIE 12184: Poster# 165. 2022. https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2627160. IM-1055498, LLNL-POST-836294.