Coronagraph experiment on dark-hole control by speckle area nulling method

In high-contrast imaging optical systems for direct observation of planets outside our solar system, adaptive optics with an accuracy of λ/10,000 root mean square is required to reduce the speckle noise down to 1 × 10−10 level in addition to the nulling coronagraph which eliminate the diffracted light. We developed the speckle area nulling (SAN) method as a new dark-hole control algorithm which is capable of controlling speckle electric field in a wide area quickly, despite an extension of speckle nulling, and is robust not relying upon an optical model. We conducted a validation experiment for the SAN method with a monochromatic light and succeeded in reducing the intensity of areal speckles by 4.4 × 10−2.