Space-borne coronagraphy

We consider the main aspects of a rather delicate discipline, space-borne coronagraphy, which is essentially performed with white-light, externally-occulted coronagraphs. Methods of observation and recent results are presented in a scientific section; a short account of historical rocket-borne and balloon-borne experiments is also given. The review concentrates on both the NRL-type coronagraphs and the HAO-type coronagraphs, stressing the essential features and merits of numerous experiments which were flown. A small section is devoted to other designs. A large number of figures, including many drawings, are used to illustrate the growing complexity of experiments.