RISTRETTO: a VLT XAO design to reach Proxima Cen b in the visible

TL;DR

The paper presents the design and simulation results of RISTRETTO, a high-contrast, high-resolution spectrograph for the VLT aimed at characterizing nearby exoplanets like Proxima Centauri b in reflected light.

Contribution

It introduces a novel adaptive optics architecture and demonstrates through simulations that RISTRETTO can achieve the required contrast and stability for exoplanet atmospheric characterization.

Findings

Achieves contrast down to 5×10^{-5} at 2λ/D in visible light.

Demonstrates stable closed-loop operation with combined wavefront sensors.

Validates performance with end-to-end simulations including atmospheric effects.

Abstract

RISTRETTO is the evolution of the original idea of coupling the VLT instruments SPHERE and ESPRESSO \cite{lovis_2016a}, aiming at High Dispersion Coronagraphy. RISTRETTO is a visitor instrument that should enable the characterization of the atmospheres of nearby exoplanets in reflected light, by using the technique of high-contrast, high-resolution spectroscopy. Its goal is to observe Prox Cen b and other planets placed at about 35mas from their star, i.e. $2\lambda/D$ at $\lambda$=750nm. The instrument is composed of an extreme adaptive optics, a coronagraphic Integral Field Unit, and a diffraction-limited spectrograph (R=140.000, $\lambda =$620-840 nm). We present the RISTRETTO XAO architecture that reach the specification, providing contrasts down to $5\times10^{-5}$ at 2$\lambda/D$ from the star in the visible, in the presence of atmosphere and low wind effect. This performance is allowed by a new two-sensors-one-dm architecture, some variations to the already known concepts of unmodulated pyWFS and zWFS, and exploiting to the maximum of their capabilities the state-of-the-art high speed, low noise cameras \& fast DM. We present the result of end-to-end simulations, that demonstrate stable closed loop operation of an unmodulated pyramid and a zernike WFS (together), and in presence of low wind effect.