Paper 14145-27
Paper 14145-27
The Roman Space Telescope optical system: status, test, and verification - update
6 July 2026 • 13:40 - 14:00 CEST | Room B4-M3
Abstract
The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (“Roman”) is NASA’s next flagship observatory. Launching in 2026, Roman will explore the nature of dark energy as well as expand the census of exoplanets in our galaxy via microlensing. Roman’s large field of view, agile survey capabilities, and excellent stability enable these scientific objectives, yet present unique challenges for the design, test, and verification of its optical system. Roman recently completed a comprehensive thermal vacuum test of the Spacecraft bus + Integrated Payload Assembly (SCIPA), followed by integrating the Outer Barrel Assembly (OBA), Solar Array Sunshield (SASS), and Deployable Aperture Cover (DAC) with SCIPA to complete the Observatory. This paper will present an overview of the thermal vacuum optical testing as well as a status of the optical system performance and verification.
Presenter
NASA Goddard Space Flight Ctr. (United States)
Dr. Bolcar is an optical systems engineer at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, where he is a member of the Wavefront Sensing and Control group in the Optics Branch. He currently serves as the optical systems lead for the Roman Space Telescope and the chief technologist for the Habitable Worlds Observatory Technology Maturation Project Office. Additional projects that he has worked on include the Large Ultraviolet/Optical/Infrared Surveyor (LUVOIR) concept study, the Thermal Infrared Sensor (TIRS) instrument on board LandSat 8, the Advanced Topographical Laser Altimeter System (ATLAS) instrument to be flown on ICESat 2, the Visible Nulling Coronagraph, and the Wide-field Imaging Interferometer Testbed. Prior to coming to Goddard, Dr. Bolcar received a B.S. in Engineering Physics from Cornell University in 2002 and earned his Ph.D. under Prof. James R. Fienup at the University of Rochester in 2009.