Speckle identification to assist the direct detection of exoplanets

Current observations in the context of exoplanet searches with coronagraphic instruments have shown that one of the main limitations to high-contrast imaging is due to residual quasi-static speckles. Speckles look like the image of a planet, but they have a different spectral behavior and are optically coherent with the star. We present two techniques to distinguish a planet from speckles. We are assuming that the optical path can be changed enough so that the speckles will change significantly between each image and therefore our model of each image having an independent source of aberrations (creating a new speckle pattern) from the other images is a good model. In the future, we would like to design and build a testbed suitable for coherent speckle detection studies. There are two techniques we want to apply to create the necessary multiple images with changing speckle patterns. The first is to use images generated using our existing deformable mirror (DM) control algorithm and the second is to put deliberate shapes on the DM to achieve the desired speckle pattern outcome.