Mercury cadmium telluride has proved itself as the material of choice for infrared detectors in the short and medium wave regions of the spectrum. A wide range of device designs are available with varying parameters and of varying sizes. Space missions are utilising these devices but studies of future requirements have identified the need for larger area, high-resolution, very low noise detector arrays that are currently not available within Europe.

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In the framework of the on-board payload data processing reference system, the computing power is de-centralised and distributed in well-defined processing modules where the applications rely on. One of the major benefits of this architecture is to allow the independent technological evolution of the modules without affecting the architecture itself: objective of this activity is therefore to provide the system with new processing models that can be, on one side, painless inserted into the exiting architecture and, on the other side, not specifically designed for a particular need.

Problem – Traditional X-ray windows

The sun sensor prototype is a sister activity to the STR on a chip pre-dev (T705-031EC). It is a follow on to SOAC. It also acts to de-risk the electronics development of the STR on a chip.

Photon counting detectors in the SWIR waveband have direct application in the areas of LIDAR missions for greenhouse gas monitoring. This activity will aim at developing a large area single MCT APD and supporting electronics to demonstrate this capability.

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see phase B - T217-059PA