UvA

The CHEOPS Planet Finder is one of the proposed second generation instruments for the VLT. Its purpose is to image and characterize giant extrasolar planets in different phases of their evolution: young, warm planets as well as old, cold ones. Imaging the last ones is the most challenging task because of the very large (>10⁸) flux contrast with their star. Detection of such faint sources close to the stars from the ground requires a very high Strehl ratio and efficient suppression of the speckle noise. Two complementary strategies, based on imaging polarimetry using fast modulation and on integral field spectroscopy, are included as scientific channels of CHEOPS, after the high order adaptive optics module. The outputs of the two channels will allow a close insight into the main properties of detected extrasolar planets. In addition, the CHEOPS instrument is well suited for a number of astrophysical projects, which are briefly described.