Advancing Compact, High-Resolution Spectrographs for Astrophysical Missions using Astrophotonics

Science motivation: A wide variety of science cases in astronomy require high-resolution spectroscopy with resolving powers (R = lambda/delta_lambda) of the order of 50,000. Some of the most significant science cases include spectroscopy of directly imaged exoplanets to study their atmospheric chemistry and kinematics, stellar spectroscopy to precisely measure elemental abundances and to potentially infer the masses of orbiting exoplanets, and quasar spectroscopy to uncover the properties of the intervening circum/intergalactic medium. Space-based high-resolution near-IR spectrographs offer two critical advantages: an unfettered access to the entire NIR band (800-2500 nm) and an unambiguous identification of source spectral features without any confusion due to a forest of absorption lines from Earth's atmosphere (tellurics). However, the volume, mass, and cost of conventional bulk-optics astronomical spectrographs grow as the cube of the telescope diameter. This makes it difficult to equip large space telescopes with such high-resolution spectrographs. Proposed Technology: : Astrophotonics is a new system-on-chip paradigm that breaks this limitation of conventional bulk-optics and yields massively miniaturized on-chip spectrographs by guiding and manipulating the light in nano-scale waveguides. We propose to build the first-ever Rubik's-cube-sized astronomical spectrograph with no movable parts, thus miniaturizing them by several orders of magnitude compared to the existing bulk-optics spectrographs while maintaining a broad operational band (~ 200 nm), high resolving power (R ~ 50,000), and high-throughput. A key limitation of current high-resolution photonic spectrographs is that they still need a conventional bulk-optics cross-disperser to separate the coarse chunks of the spectrum (spectral orders). We propose to overcome this limitation by cascading and mating a high-resolution photonic spectrograph with a stack of matched low-resolution spectrographs to separate the spectral orders, and thus, obtain a broadband spectrum at high resolution. Furthermore, we will employ an innovative technique of drizzled photonic spectroscopy to computationally multiply the resolving power by nearly a factor of 3, which helps in pushing the resolving power to 150,000 while maintaining a broad operational band. Our approach will yield a compact design, free from any intermediate cross-dispersion optics, thus further enhancing its stability. Our team has extensive expertise in developing astrophotonic spectrographs and various other photonic technologies (photonic lanterns, beam combiners, tunable delays, etc). The PI has invented the drizzling photonic spectrograph concept. Relevance to NASA: High-contrast imaging of exoplanets is one of the prime goals of NASA's flagship Habitable Worlds Observatory. High-resolution spectroscopy of these directly imaged planets is the natural next step to get the maximum science return out of the large aperture and exquisite high-contrast instrumentation. The high-contrast imaging technology is also directly suitable to feed the light into single-mode fibers, and pass on to compact photonic spectrographs instead of bulky conventional ones. The compactness dramatically improves the stability and SWAP (size, weight, and power), making the instrument easier to incorporate in both small and large missions. The technology goes well beyond NASA's astrophysical missions and can be directly incorporated for applications to NASA's solar/planetary, and Earth-observing/remote-sensing missions.

This is a mature technology (TRL 7+) — the realistic path in is usually NASA's Technology Transfer Program: licensing an existing NASA patent, or a Space Act Agreement to use NASA facilities/expertise directly. NASA also runs a startup licensing program with no upfront fee for companies formed to commercialize a specific NASA technology.

None of these are guaranteed paths for this specific project — TechPort itself doesn't have an "apply" button. Reaching out to the contact(s) above with a specific question is usually the fastest way to find out what's actually open.