Dr. Prashant Pathak

The direct imaging of rocky exoplanets is one of the key science goals of current and upcoming large telescopes. The contrast requirement for imaging such planets is challenging. However, the mid-IR (infrared) regime provides the optimum contrast to directly detect the thermal signatures of exoplanets in our solar neighbourhood. In this talk, I will cover two mid-IR high-contrast imaging (HCI) instruments: NEAR (Earths in the Alpha Cen Region) and METIS (mid-infrared imager and spectrograph). The NEAR experiment: demonstration of HCI capability at ten microns, can reach sub-mJy detection sensitivity in a few hours of observation time, which is sufficient to detect a few Jupiter mass planets in nearby systems. I will cover the working and science results obtained with the instrument. METIS is the 1st generation ELT (Extremely Large Telescope) instrument. I will discuss its HCI capabilities, and the system engineering behind its final design and performance.