Habitable Worlds Observatory Wavefront Sensing and Control: Methods for Ultrastability

Coronagraphic observations on the Habitable Worlds Observatory will only be possible if the telescope and coronagraph optics can be made ultrastable, with the goal of limiting changes in raw contrast during observations to the order of $10^{-12}$. Current modeling of the HWO Exploratory Analysis Configuration 1 design concept shows that there will be significant thermal and vibrational disturbances coupling through to the Optical Telescope Assembly and coronagraph optics. This paper presents Wavefront Sensing and Control (WFSC) methods for EAC-1 that, with further technology development, can compensate these disturbances, to limit total wavefront error to the single-digit picometers to meet this stringent delta-contrast goal.