title: Recent white-light coronagraphs at the Naval Research Laboratory.
abstract: A white-light externally occulted coronagraph is a telescope designed to view the very faint emission of the solar corona in the region close to the sun. It uses the Lyot principle to mitigate the effects of diffraction. The first such telescope flew on a spacecraft in 1971 and showed the dynamic nature of the corona. Since that mission, six other such coronagraphic telescopes have been flown, whose designs evolved to meet the requirements of the mission. This article describes the latest two coronagraphs and compares their capabilities and their designs.
authors.forename: Russell A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Howard