Project number
27002
Organization
BAE Systems
Offering
ENGR498-F2026-S2027
The Roman Space Telescope Wide Field Instrument (WFI) aims to answer fundamental questions about dark matter, dark energy, and exoplanet quantities. As the name denotes, its wide field of view enables it to capture 100x more information than Hubble but with the same angular resolution. It contains a filter wheel that enables the scientists to select which wavelengths of light are captured in each picture and can autonomously switch between them to capture the same scene in different bands. Roman’s mission is a survey mission, meaning that it will continuously tile across the sky to capture vast swaths of the sky in high-resolution.
The senior design team will produce a ground-based imager that will tile the sky in different wavelength bands similar to WFI, but with achievable complexity for a senior design project. The team will be fed clearly-scoped requirements on Field of Regard (FOR) for tiling, maximum time allowable for imaging FOR, number of bands, angular resolution, and dimmest stars that must be resolved. The imager will autonomously move between portions of the FOR, capture images in different wavelength bands across the visible and near infrared, and save out results to a computer. The computer will stitch the images together and save out a final set of images for each pass on the FOR. The project will require careful optical and mechanical design for stability across images, and radiometric analysis to inform key design decisions. The students will be mentored by readily accessible and experienced BAE Systems engineers with expertise in optical design, stray light, and software.
The senior design team will produce a ground-based imager that will tile the sky in different wavelength bands similar to WFI, but with achievable complexity for a senior design project. The team will be fed clearly-scoped requirements on Field of Regard (FOR) for tiling, maximum time allowable for imaging FOR, number of bands, angular resolution, and dimmest stars that must be resolved. The imager will autonomously move between portions of the FOR, capture images in different wavelength bands across the visible and near infrared, and save out results to a computer. The computer will stitch the images together and save out a final set of images for each pass on the FOR. The project will require careful optical and mechanical design for stability across images, and radiometric analysis to inform key design decisions. The students will be mentored by readily accessible and experienced BAE Systems engineers with expertise in optical design, stray light, and software.