Superconducting detector array successfully deployed through NIST collaboration. (News Briefs).In collaboration with the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center on June 2, 2001, NIST (National Institute of Standards & Technology, Washington, DC, www.nist.gov) The standards-defining agency of the U.S. government, formerly the National Bureau of Standards. It is one of three agencies that fall under the Technology Administration (www.technology. successfully deployed a new type of superconducting detector at the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory at the summit of Mauna Kea Mauna Kea (mou`nə kā`ə), dormant volcano, 13,796 ft (4,205 m) high, in the south central part of the island of Hawaii. It is the loftiest peak in the Hawaiian Islands and the highest island mountain in the world, rising c. , Hawaii. The FIBRE instrument consists of a FabryPerot spectrometer with an 8 pixel detector array of superconducting transition-edge sensor (TES TES Times Educational Supplement (publication) TES The Elder Scrolls (series of computer games) TES Thermal Emission Spectrometer TES Teaching Every Student TES Thermal Energy Storage ) bobmeters. The array is read out using a superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID) multiplexer. Both the bolometer bolometer (bōlŏm`ətər, bə–), instrument for detecting and measuring radiation, e.g., visible light, infrared radiation, and ultraviolet radiation, in amounts as small as one millionth of an erg. array and the SQUID multiplexers were invented and fabricated at NIST. This technology is a revolutionary breakthrough for materials analysis, astronomical and other photon detection applications. FIBRE is the first astronomical demonstration of both TES submillimeter bolometers and SQUID multiplexers. Although the weather was extremely poor, the spectrometer detected the limb of the moon with a spectral resolving power resolving power: see telescope. Resolving power (optics) A quantitative measure of the ability of an optical instrument to produce separable images. of = 1100 at a wavelength of 365 [micro]m. In better weather conditions, FIBRE will be used to study CO rotational lin es and the fine structure line of Cl in distant galaxies. CONTACT: Kent Irwin, (303) 497-5911; irwin@boulder.nist.gov. |
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