Science Leads. Design Enables.
Watch the design walk-through below to see how LUVOIR was designed to enable a wide range of revolutionary science.
Modular & Serviceable
Envisioned as a long term observatory for a new generation of astronomers. Designed from the start with modularity and serviceability in mind.
JWST Deployment Heritage
LUVOIR A
LUMOS
LUVOIR Ultraviolet Multi Object Spectrograph
LUMOS is a multi-object spectrograph covering far-UV through visible wavelengths (100-1000 nm), capable of observing hundreds of targets at once in a wide field of view. LUMOS features high-, medium-, and low-resolution multi-object imaging spectroscopy and far-UV imaging modes. LUMOS can be considered as a successor to the Hubble Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) instrument, with two orders-of-magnitude higher efficiency, multi-object capability, and a wide-field multi-band imaging channel.
Total Bandpass
MOS Field of View
Spectral Resolution
Apertures
100 - 1000 nm
2' x 2'
500 - 56,000
4 x 420 x 840 individually configurable
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Up to 840 simultaneous spectra
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FUV imaging mode
HDI
High Definition Imager
HDI is the primary instrument for imaging observations in the near-UV through near-IR. The HDI design provides a 2x3 arcminute field of view, taking full advantage of the angular resolution provided by the telescope, and consists of two channels: a UV/visible channel (200-950 nm) and a near-IR channel (800-2500 nm). The focal plane detector arrays provide Nyquist sampled images at 500 nm for UVIS imaging and at 1000 nm for NIR imaging.
Total Bandpass
Field of View
Number of Science Filters
200 - 2500 nm
2' x 3'
UV/Vis: 41; NIR: 26
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Nyquist sampled at 500 nm for UV/VIS, 1000 nm for NIR
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High-precision astrometry
ECLIPS
Extreme Coronagraph for Living Planetary Systems
The ECLIPS coronagraph is designed to suppress the overwhelming glare of starlight so that faint planets can be seen adjacent to their parent stars. ECLIPS will achieve a target contrast ratio of < 10^-10 to accomplish these observations. ECLIPS has three simultaneous channels: near-UV (200-525 nm), optical (515-1030 nm), and near-IR (1000-2000 nm). Each channel is equipped with two deformable mirrors for wavefront control, a suite of coronagraph masks, a low-order/out-of-band wavefront sensor, and a science integral field spectrograph and/or imaging camera. ECLIPS incorporates both Apodized Pupil Lyot Coronagraph (APLC) and Apodized Vortex Coronagraph (AVC) designs. ECLIPS would enable, for the first time, direct imaging and spectroscopy of dozens of potentially Earth-like exoplanets, revealing whether we are alone in the universe.
Total Bandpass
Contrast
Inner Working Angle
Outer Working Angle
Spectral Resolution
200 - 2000 nm
1 x 10^-10
2 - 3.5 l/D
64 l/D
Vis: 140; NIR: 70, 200
POLLUX
POLLUX is a European contribution to the LUVOIR mission concept study. It is a UV spectro-polarimeter with high resolution point source capability (R =120,000) that would be complementary to the LUMOS instrument. It is defined and designed by a consortium of 10 European institutions, with leadership and support from the French Space Agency (CNES).
100 - 400 nm
120,000
Total Bandpass
Spectral Resolution
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Circular + linear polarization
