The techniques and procedures developed for the instrument will serve as a foundation for future coronagraphic missions such as the Habitable Worlds Observatory. The methods for diffraction propagation, wavefront control, and structural and thermal finite-element modeling are detailed. The coronagraphic modes are thoroughly described, including characteristics most readily derived from modeling. Scientists have discovered more than 5,000 exoplanets, or planets outside our solar system. Putting it together will require a highly choreographed dance. With the instrument now being integrated in preparation for launch within the next few years, the present state of the end-to-end modeling is described, including the measured flight components such as deformable mirrors. The Coronagraph Instrument on NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will study planets around other stars. Over the past decade the performance of the coronagraph in its flight environment has been simulated with increasingly detailed diffraction and structural/thermal finite element modeling.
It is expected to be able to detect and characterize mature, giant exoplanets in reflected visible light. The mission was recommended as the top priority for the next decade of astronomy in the 2010 United States National Research Council Decadal Survey. The Roman Space Telescope will have the first advanced coronagraph in space, with deformable mirrors for wavefront control, low-order wavefront sensing and maintenance, and a photon-counting detector. The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, formerly the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST), is a NASA space observatory currently in development.
