The CHARON program.
Abstract
CHARON (Calern High Angular Resolution Optical Network) is a French ground-based imaging stellar interferometer project. Its aim is to provide two dimensional high resolution images by aperture synthesis at visible wavelength. It is a prototype intended to demonstrate the feasibility of phase closure with independent telescopes. The instrument consists in three 26 cm telescopes movable on 100 m baselines, and three optical delay lines to compensate the optical paths. The recombining optics includes a three-channel image tracker and a fringe tracker. The image reconstruction is done by an original method including bispectral analysis and avoiding the use of any a priori model. CHARON is also a test bench for some aspects of the interferometric mode of the VLT. The authors report the concept of this project, its current status, and also the first visibility measurement with two telescopes and two delay lines.
- Publication:
-
ESA Special Publication
- Pub Date:
- May 1992
- Bibcode:
- 1992ESASP.344..243S
- Keywords:
-
- Image Reconstruction;
- Interferometry;
- Optical Paths;
- Space Observations (From Earth);
- Stellar Physics;
- Telescopes;
- Angular Resolution;
- Data Processing;
- Delay;
- High Resolution;
- Light (Visible Radiation);
- Synthetic Apertures;
- Astronomy