The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) Mission
Fiona A. Harrison, William W. Craig, Finn E. Christensen, Charles J. Hailey, Will W. Zhang, Steven E. Boggs, Daniel Stern, W. Rick Cook, Karl Forster, Paolo Gio… 展开作者
Fiona A. Harrison, William W. Craig, Finn E. Christensen, Charles J. Hailey, Will W. Zhang, Steven E. Boggs, Daniel Stern, W. Rick Cook, Karl Forster, Paolo Giommi, Brian W. Grefenstette, Yunjin Kim, Takao Kitaguchi, Jason E Koglin, Kristin K. Madsen, Peter H. Mao, Hiromasa Miyasaka, Kaya Mori, Matteo Perri, Michael J. Pivovaroff, Simonetta Puccetti, Vikram R. Rana, Niels J. Westergaard, Jason Willis, Andreas Zoglauer, Hongjun An, Matteo Bachetti, Nicolas M. Barriere, Eric C. Bellm, Varun Bhalerao, Nicolai F. Brejnholt, Felix Fuerst, Carl C. Liebe, Craig B. Markwardt, Melania Nynka, Julia K. Vogel, Dominic J. Walton, Daniel R. Wik, David M. Alexander, Lynn R. Cominsky, Ann E. Hornschemeier, Allan Hornstrup, Victoria M. Kaspi, Greg M. Madejski, Giorgio Matt, Silvano Molendi, David M. Smith, John A. Tomsick, Marco Ajello, David R. Ballantyne, Mislav Balokovic, Diddier Barret, Franz E. Bauer, Roger D. Blandford, W. Niel Brandt, Laura W. Brenneman, James Chiang, Deepto Chakrabarty, Jerome Chenevez, Andrea Comastri, Martin Elvis, Andrew C. Fabian, Duncan Farrah, Chris L. Fryer, Eric V. Gotthelf, Jonathan E. Grindlay, David J. Helfand, Roman Krivonos, David L. Meier, Jon M. Miller, Lorenzo Natalucci, Patrick Ogle, Eran O. Ofek, Andrew Ptak, Stephen P. Reynolds, Jand R. Rigby, Gianpiero Tagliaferri, Stephen E. Thorsett, Ezequiel Treister, C. Megan Urry
The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) mission, launched on 13 June 2012, is the first focusing high-energy X-ray telescope in orbit. NuSTAR operates in the band from 3 -- 79 keV, extending the sensitivity of focusing far beyond the ~10 keV high-energy cutoff achieved by all previous X-ray satellites. The inherently low-background associated with concentrating the X-ray light enables NuSTAR to probe the hard X-ray sky with a more than one-hundred-fold improvement in sensitivity over the collimated or coded-mask instruments that have operated in this bandpass. Using its unprecedented combination of sensitivity, spatial and spectral resolution, NuSTAR will pursue five primary scientific objectives, and will also undertake a broad program of targeted observations. The observatory consists of two co-aligned grazing-incidence X-ray telescopes pointed at celestial targets by a three-axis stabilized spacecraft. Deployed into a 600 km, near-circular, 6degree inclination orbit, the Observatory has now completed commissioning, and is performing consistent with pre-launch expectations. NuSTAR is now executing its primary science mission, and with an expected orbit lifetime of ten years, we anticipate proposing a guest investigator program, to begin in Fall 2014.
Tuning of Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) to improve low energy threshold of future Hard X-ray Imaging Detectors
In-flight PSF calibration of the NuSTAR hard X-ray optics
本文介绍了核光谱望远镜阵列（NuSTAR）硬X射线光学系统的点扩散函数（PSF）标定结果。在发射后不久，NuSTAR就观测到了Cyg X-1、Vela X-1和Her X-1等亮点源，用于PSF校准。我们使用的点源观测在几个离轴角度与射线跟踪模型来表征在轨道上的角响应，并发现射线跟踪模型单独不适合所观察到的事件分布和应用经验校正的射线跟踪模型，提高了拟合显着。我们描述了应用于射线跟踪模型的修正，并表明新PSF模型的封闭能量分数（EEF）的不确定性为< 3% for extraction apertures of R >60”，没有显着的能量依赖性。我们还表明，在其在轨运行期间，NuSTAR光学器件的PSF在约300天的时间内一直保持稳定。
Spectral calibration and modeling of the NuSTAR CdZnTe pixel detectors
核光谱望远镜阵列（NuSTAR）将是第一个聚焦于硬X射线（5-80 keV）波段的空间飞行任务。NuSTAR仪器携带两个共对准掠入射硬X射线望远镜。每个NuSTAR焦平面由四个2 mm CdZnTe混合像素探测器组成，每个探测器的有效收集面积为2 cm x 2 cm。每个混合电路由一个32 x 32的605微米像素阵列组成，用加州理工学院定制的低噪声NuCIT ASIC读出。为了将每个像素的光谱响应特性描述为满足科学校准要求所需的程度，我们开发了一个基于Geant 4的模型，并为NuSTAR混合设计定制了Shockley-Ramo定理。该模型结合了蒙特卡罗的X射线相互作用与随后的电荷传输内的检测器。使用Co-57，Eu-155和Am-241的放射性源的该模型和校准数据的组合使我们能够确定每个像素的电子和空穴迁移率寿命产品，并将实际性能与无缺陷材料的理想性能进行比较。
The EXoplanet Climate Infrared TElescope (EXCITE): A balloon-borne mission to measure spectroscopic phase curves of transiting hot Jupiters
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center（美国宇航局戈达德太空飞行中心）；Brown University（布朗大学）；Arizona State University（亚利桑那州立大学）；La Sapienza Università di Roma（罗马第一大学）；Cornell University（康奈尔大学）；StarSpec Technologies Inc.（StarSpec科技有限公司）；Center for Space Sciences and Technology, University of Maryland, Baltimore County（马里兰大学巴尔的摩县分校空间科学与技术中心）
