The winners of the grand prize, researchers at the CNRS, ONERA, Paris Observatory - PSL and Universities, were at the heart of the SPHERE project, an instrument installed at the Very Large Telescope (ESO - Chile) and dedicated to the imaging of young giant exoplanets.
Between 2002 and 2015, using new technologies such as extreme adaptive optics and coronography, the team led the design, development and commissioning of the instrument. SPHERE has already provided a very large number of major results such as the identification of new giant exoplanets and the study of their atmosphere, or the detailed study of the circumstellar disks in which planets form. Today, a further step is envisaged with a significant evolution towards the SPHERE+ project aiming at increasing the contrast near the observed stars. SPHERE+ will use ever more efficient technologies to reach the region where most of the giant exoplanets are located, and to observe more weak stars.
SPHERE+ is an intermediate step in preparing an even more ambitious program for the ESO Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) in which the winning team is involved. This work will also have instrumental and astrophysical spin-offs for future space missions such as
JWST and the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (formerly WFIRST), and in the longer term, to initiate space projects over the next few decades, aimed at enabling the imaging and characterization of possible Earth-like telluric exoplanets.
In this unique adventure combining major scientific and technological challenges, the LESIA teams participated in the elaboration of the SPHERE concept based on numerical simulations, in the development of coronographs and adaptive optics, and concerning data processing, in close collaboration with IPAG, LAM, and ONERA. Since SPHERE was put into service, LESIA researchers have been using this instrument to study very diverse objects such as exoplanets, circumstellar disks, advanced stars, small bodies in the solar system, or the active nuclei of galaxies.
Anthony Boccaletti, winner of the prize for LESIA is a CNRS research fellow at the Paris Observatory - PSL. He has studied and implemented high-contrast imaging techniques and has participated extensively in the astrophysical exploitation of SPHERE, notably with the discovery of dust structures in the exoplanetary system of AU Microscopii or more recently with the probable image of a planet in formation in the AB Aurigae. He participated in the design of the coronographs of the MIRI imager on JWST. More recently he has been involved in the organization of the SPHERE+ project.
The whole team would like to thank the Institut de France, the Charles Defforey Foundation and the [Académie des Sciences] for the award of this prestigious prize->http://www.institut-de-france.fr/fr/article/3524-grands-prix-2020-des-fondations-de-linstitut-de-france] which will allow a significant progress of its projects in the context of exoplanet imaging .
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
[1] Université Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, IPAG (Grenoble)]), Thierry Fusco [[ONERA, Département d’Optique et Techniques Associées (DOTA)], [[Aix-Marseille Université, CNRS, CNES, LAM (Marseille)], Maud Langlois [CNRS, CRAL, University Lyon 1, ENS Lyon, Observatoire de Lyon
