NAIR - Novel Astronomical Instrumentation based on Photonic Light Reformatting

• Applicants: Professor Dr. Lucas Labadie; Dr. Kalaga Madhav, Ph.D., since 4/2019; Professor Dr. Andreas Quirrenbach
• Subject Area: Astrophysics and Astronomy
• Term: from 2017 to 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 326946494

Photonic reformatting is a technique that utilizes photonic components to improve the performance of astronomical instruments through a spatial rearrangement - or reformatting - of the distribution of starlight collected by a telescope. This reformatting enables new instrument concepts. It is essential for advancing ultra-high-precision measurements, such as the search for Earth-like planets around other stars, and for keeping the size and cost of instruments for the new generation of extremely large telescopes within reasonable limits. The compactness, robustness and flexibility of photonic components bring many advantages over classical "bulk optics" solutions, but their physical properties must be better understood and device architectures optimized. The top-level objective of the NAIR project is bringing the emerging technology of photonic light reformatting into the mainstream of astronomical instrumentation.The work program will concentrate on two main themes, incoherent reformatters targeting spectroscopic applications, and coherent reformatters targeting interferometric applications, both addressing high priority science goals identified in the European Astronomy Technology Roadmap. We will start with the development of novel instrument concepts, and the modeling of key photonic components and devices. This will enable us to derive specifications, which we can pass on to partners who will then fabricate custom-made reformatting devices. We will work with them to optimize the manufacturing methods and processes, and we will perform thorough characterization and testing of the components we receive. Initially this will be done in our laboratories with highly controlled input parameters. Afterwards we will take advantage of the 72cm Waltz telescope of the Landessternwarte, which provides more realistic conditions. In the subsequent stages we will take our reformatter prototypes to the CANARY test bench at the 4.2m William Herschel Telescope and most likely to the CARMENES spectrograph at the 3.5m telescope on Calar Alto. These latter facilities will provide an environment that is fully representative of "state of the art" large telescopes, and these should in turn benefit from the improvements in precision that photonic devices can provide. We will conclude with the design of pioneering science-capable instrument prototypes for 8 to 10m class telescopes, which would form the basis for the second three-year project phase.We intend to complement this R&D program with an annual two-day "German Astrophotonics Forum" workshop series, designed to foster collaboration between the photonics and astronomical instrumentation communities, and to inform young researchers about opportunities in this field.The NAIR project will thus constitute a coordinated activity performing a systematic evaluation of novel photonic reformatting techniques for applications in astronomy, and to develop revolutionary instrument concepts based on these technologies.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigators: Dr. Robert Harris, Ph.D.; Raymond Haynes
• Ehemalige Antragsteller: Dr. Stefano Minardi, Ph.D., until 3/2018; Dr. Ettore Pedretti, from 3/2018 until 4/2019