Miniature Distributed Occulter Telescope (mDOT): A Concept for a Smallsat Mission to Observe Extrasolar Zodiacal Dust and Exoplanets
Abstract
Starshade missions use a free-flying occulter to block the light of a bright star while a separate telescope observers faint extrasolar planets or other sources orbiting it. Full-scale occulter missions involve 30-m starshades at separations of tens of thousands of km. The Miniaturized Distributed Occulter/Telescope (mDOT) is a concept for an astrophysics small satellite mission using a sub-scale occulter in low earth orbit. mDOT consists of an occulter microsatellite carrying a 3-m starshade and a Cubesat carrying a 10 cm telescope. During operations, the occulter manuevers so the telescope is in its shadow as they cross the equator, allowing ~5 minutes of observations per ~90 minute orbit. Over the course of a year, the field of regard precesses around the entire range of right ascension. The starshade achieves a suppression of 10-7, allowing the telescope to observe circumstellar debris disks or zodiacal dust at blue to UV wavelengths with a sensitivity down to ~5 times solar-system dust-density levels. A slightly larger mission (20-30 cm telescope) would reach the sensitivity needed to image extrasolar giant planets. mDOT would provide a practical low-cost demonstration of starshade concepts while also observing debris disks at new wavelengths and sensitivity levels.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2019
- Bibcode:
- 2019AGUFM.A43F..08M
- Keywords:
-
- 0399 General or miscellaneous;
- ATMOSPHERIC COMPOSITION AND STRUCTURE;
- 1699 General or miscellaneous;
- GLOBAL CHANGE;
- 7599 General or miscellaneous;
- SOLAR PHYSICS;
- ASTROPHYSICS;
- AND ASTRONOMY;
- 7899 General or miscellaneous;
- SPACE PLASMA PHYSICS