The large UV/optical/infrared surveyor (LUVOIR): decadal mission study update

Abstract

NASA commissioned the study of four large mission concepts, including the Large Ultraviolet / Optical / Infrared (LUVOIR) Surveyor, to be evaluated by the 2020 Decadal Survey in Astrophysics. In response, the Science and Technology Definition Team (STDT) identified a broad range of science objectives for LUVOIR that include the direct imaging and spectral characterization of habitable exoplanets around sun-like stars, the study of galaxy formation and evolution, the exchange of matter between galaxies, star and planet formation, and the remote sensing of Solar System objects. To meet these objectives, the LUVOIR Study Office, located at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), completed the first design iteration of a 15-m segmented-aperture observatory that would be launched by the Space Launch System (SLS) Block 2 configuration. The observatory includes four serviceable instruments: the <i>Extreme Coronagraph for Living Planetary Systems</i> (ECLIPS), an optical / near-infrared coronagraph capable of delivering 10⁻¹⁰ contrast at inner working angles as small as 2 &lambda;/D; the <i>LUVOIR UV Multi-object Spectrograph </i>(LUMOS), which will provide low- and medium-resolution UV (100 – 400 nm) multi-object imaging spectroscopy in addition to far-UV imaging; the <i>High Definition Imager </i>(HDI), a high-resolution wide-field-of-view NUV-Optical-NIR imager; and <i>Pollux</i>, a high-resolution UV spectro-polarimeter being contributed by Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES). The study team has executed a second design iteration to further improve upon the 15-m concept, while simultaneously studying an 8-m concept. In these proceedings, we provide an update on these two architectures.