Here is the video recording of my talk “The quest for exoplanet direct imaging with ELT apertures,” part of the NASA ExoExplorer 2022 science series.
Abstract: Direct imaging of exoplanets is a promising route to finding and characterizing exoplanets in the thermal infrared. Currently the technique is most sensitive to massive, young planets on wide orbits. Innovative observing techniques are necessary to probe smaller angles from host stars, or search for older or lower-mass planets. The Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) is in a unique position to push these frontiers in preparation for the era of 30-m-class extremely large telescopes. When light is combined coherently in a “Fizeau” mode between the LBT’s twin 8.4-m sub-telescopes, the facility effectively becomes a masked 22.7-m telescope. I will present an observation of the nearby star Altair in this mode, which represents the first LBT Fizeau dataset with a degree of automated phase control. These data constrain the existence of companions of 1.3 M⊙ down to an inner angle of ≈0.15", closer than any previously published direct imaging of Altair. I outline ways forward, in terms of software and physical upgrades, and post-processing with longer integration times.