Alignment and ground calibration of the Carruthers GeoCoronal Imager

Kodi Rider; Jason McPhate; Cathy Chou; Thomas Immel; Martin Sirk; William Craig; Anna Butterworth; Lara Waldrop; Alex Zhang; Evan Widloski; Jérémy Brisbois; Jean-François Vandenrijt; Pascal Blain; John Clarke

doi:10.1117/12.3018528

21 August 2024 Alignment and ground calibration of the Carruthers GeoCoronal Imager

Kodi Rider, Jason McPhate, Cathy Chou, Thomas Immel, Martin Sirk, William Craig, Anna Butterworth, Lara Waldrop, Alex Zhang, Evan Widloski, Jérémy Brisbois, Jean-François Vandenrijt, Pascal Blain, John Clarke

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 13093, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2024: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray; 1309339 (2024) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3018528
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2024, Yokohama, Japan

Conference Poster

Abstract

The Carruthers Geocorona Observatory is a NASA Heliophysics mission designed to study the variability of Earth’s hydrogen exosphere. Launching in 2025, the Carruthers GeoCoronal Imager (GCI) will observe the exosphere at Far Ultraviolet wavelengths from an Earth-Sun L1 vantage point. The GCI consists of two coaligned imagers that simultaneously provide both wide field observations of the entire exosphere, in addition to high spatial resolution observations near the Earth’s limb. The optical prescription for both the narrow field imager (NFI) and wide field imager (WFI) is discussed, including critical analyses that were performed during the design phase of the project. A deterministic alignment approach was adopted to verify performances of the imagers at visible wavelengths prior to verification in the vacuum ultraviolet. The details of this alignment plan, along with opto-mechanical considerations and requirements are discussed in detail. Finally, we discuss the imaging performance of the system in the ultraviolet utilizing a ground calibration facility previously developed for another NASA spaceflight mission.

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Kodi Rider, Jason McPhate, Cathy Chou, Thomas Immel, Martin Sirk, William Craig, Anna Butterworth, Lara Waldrop, Alex Zhang, Evan Widloski, Jérémy Brisbois, Jean-François Vandenrijt, Pascal Blain, and John Clarke "Alignment and ground calibration of the Carruthers GeoCoronal Imager", Proc. SPIE 13093, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2024: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray, 1309339 (21 August 2024); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3018528

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