Testbed for measuring ultraviolet contrast of next generation microshutter arrays

Microshutter arrays are powerful tools enabling simultaneous spectroscopy of multiple objects within a single, crowded field-of-view. This technology is currently employed on the James Webb Space Telescope, and next-generation arrays are being proposed for future flagship missions such as LUVOIR and HabEx. For these future large missions, it is important to fully characterize the performance of the next-generation microshutter arrays in the lab, particularly in the ultraviolet range not probed with JWST. To this end, we have developed a laboratory testbed to measure the contrast between opened and closed shutters achievable with these devices.