The PICTURE-C exoplanetary imaging balloon mission: second flight results and the transition to a new mission, PICTURE-D

Abstract

The PICTURE-C balloon mission launched on its second flight from Fort Sumner, NM on September 28, 2022. During this flight, PICTURE-C, which consists of a 60 cm off-axis telescope feeding a vector vortex coronagraph, demonstrated the first high-contrast dark hole from an observatory in a near-space environment. The coronagraph achieved a modest broadband (20%) contrast ratio of 5×10´6, with performance limited by dynamic pointing transients. The low-order wavefront control system achieved optical pointing stabilization of 1 milliarcseconds RMS for intervals of up to 30 seconds between these transients. This paper will summarize the second flight results and present the development path for PICTURE-D, the next generation direct imaging balloon mission. © 2023 SPIE.