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The Focal Plane Assembly for the Athena X-Ray Integral Field Unit InstrumentThis paper summarizes a preliminary design concept for the focal plane assembly of the X-ray Integral Field Unit on the Athena spacecraft, an imaging microcalorimeter that will enable high spectral resolution imaging and point-source spectroscopy. The instrument's sensor array will be a 3840-pixel transition edge sensor (TES) microcalorimeter array, with a frequency domain multiplexed SQUID readout system allowing this large-format sensor array to be operated within the thermal constraints of the instrument's cryogenic system. A second TES detector will be operated in close proximity to the sensor array to detect cosmic rays and secondary particles passing through the sensor array for off-line coincidence detection to identify and reject events caused by the in-orbit high-energy particle background. The detectors, operating at 55 mK, or less, will be thermally isolated from the instrument cryostat's 2 K stage, while shielding and filtering within the FPA will allow the instrument's sensitive sensor array to be operated in the expected environment during both on-ground testing and in-flight operation, including stray light from the cryostat environment, low-energy photons entering through the X-ray aperture, low-frequency magnetic fields, and high-frequency electric fields.
Document ID
20170005823
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Conference Paper
External Source(s)
Authors
Jackson, B. D.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Groningen, Netherlands)
Van Weers, H.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
van der Kuur, J.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
den Hartog, R.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
Akamatsu, H.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
Argan, A.
(Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziale (INAF-IAPS) Rome, Italy)
Bandler, S. R.
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD United States)
Barbera, M.
(Palermo Univ. Italy)
Barret, D.
(Research Inst. in Astrophysics and Planetology (IRAP) Toulouse, France)
Bruijn, M. P.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
Chervenak, J. A.
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD United States)
Dercksen, J.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
Gatti, F.
(Genoa Univ. Genoa, Italy)
Gottardi, L.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
Haas, D.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
den Herder, J.-W.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
Kilbourne, C. A.
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD United States)
Kiviranta, M.
(Technical Research Centre of Finland Espoo, Finland)
Lam-Trong, T.
(Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales Toulouse, France)
van Leeuwen, B.-J.
(Space Research Organization Netherlands Utrecht, Netherlands)
Macculi, C.
(Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziale (INAF-IAPS) Rome, Italy)
Piro, L.
(Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziale (INAF-IAPS) Rome, Italy)
Smith, S. J.
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD United States)
Date Acquired
June 28, 2017
Publication Date
July 19, 2016
Publication Information
Publication: SPIE Proceedings
Publisher: SPIE
Volume: 9905
Subject Category
Astrophysics
Report/Patent Number
GSFC-E-DAA-TN43499
Meeting Information
Meeting: Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2016
Location: Edinburgh
Country: United Kingdom
Start Date: June 26, 2016
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other
Keywords
SQUID amplifier
transition edge sensor
cryogenic anti-coincidence detector
X-ray microcalorimeter

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