New facility development underway for ATHENA telescope calibration
The ESA Advanced Telescope for High Energy Astrophysics (ATHENA) is the second largest mission of ESA’s Cosmic Vision Science program and will be the largest X-ray optics ever built. Planned to launch in 2031, ATHENA will become one of the most powerful tools ever built for astrophysics observations.
The mission intends to study clusters of hot gaseous matter, from super massive black holes that formed in our early Universe to galaxy clusters, and their structures.
To do this, ATHENA will use the largest ever-built X-ray mirror. The mirror will be built using the ESA Silicon Pore Optics (SPO) technology, which provides a large effective area with excellent angular resolution.
The state-of-the-art nature of the ATHENA telescope means that currently, operation facilities on the ground, used to calibrate the instrument, are not able to meet mission requirements.
But an activity with TDE and the Istituto Nazionale Di Astrofisica, Italy, called VERT-X, will begin to develop an innovative calibration system that will be able to accomplish this extremely challenging task.
The concept design is based on an X-ray beam produced by a source and then focused on a high-performance grazing-incidence mirror collimator, which will narrow the beam and focus it to produce an image. The X-ray beam will then be accurately moved by a raster-scan mechanism, a type of graphic monitor, which sweeps the beam across the surface one row at a time, until an image is displayed. This will produce images for the entire range of ATHENA’s optics in one-hour timescales.
To implement this concept a detailed design of the entire facility has been developed. Measurements at different off-axis angles can be performed by tilting the mechanism up to 3 degrees and the entire system will be enclosed in a vertical 18 metres high and up to 7 metres wide vertical vacuum chamber.
This relatively compact and vertical geometry is unique in simplifying the mirror supports required by the facility and makes the location flexible.
VERT-X is being developed in two main phases. The first phase is already underway and will realise and test the most critical parts of the systems – the X-ray source assembly (including both the x-ray source and mirror), and the raster scan mechanism, including the tip/tilt metrology.
The second phase will develop the Thermal Vacuum Chamber together with the remaining elements of the testing system.
The facility is planned to be completed in 2025, with the intention that once it is launched, the ATHENA mirror assembly calibration tasks can be completely accomplished in just 6 months.
4000126229 has been initiated
The ESA Advanced Telescope for High Energy Astrophysics (ATHENA) is the second largest mission of ESA’s Cosmic Vision Science program and will be the largest X-ray optics ever built. Planned to launch in 2031, ATHENA will become one of the most powerful tools ever built for astrophysics observations.
The mission intends to study clusters of hot gaseous matter, from super massive black holes that formed in our early Universe to galaxy clusters, and their structures.
To do this, ATHENA will use the largest ever-built X-ray mirror. The mirror will be built using the ESA Silicon Pore Optics (SPO) technology, which provides a large effective area with excellent angular resolution.
The state-of-the-art nature of the ATHENA telescope means that currently, operation facilities on the ground, used to calibrate the instrument, are not able to meet mission requirements.
But an activity with TDE and the Istituto Nazionale Di Astrofisica, Italy, called VERT-X, will begin to develop an innovative calibration system that will be able to accomplish this extremely challenging task.
The concept design is based on an X-ray beam produced by a source and then focused on a high-performance grazing-incidence mirror collimator, which will narrow the beam and focus it to produce an image. The X-ray beam will then be accurately moved by a raster-scan mechanism, a type of graphic monitor, which sweeps the beam across the surface one row at a time, until an image is displayed. This will produce images for the entire range of ATHENA’s optics in one-hour timescales.
To implement this concept a detailed design of the entire facility has been developed. Measurements at different off-axis angles can be performed by tilting the mechanism up to 3 degrees and the entire system will be enclosed in a vertical 18 metres high and up to 7 metres wide vertical vacuum chamber.
This relatively compact and vertical geometry is unique in simplifying the mirror supports required by the facility and makes the location flexible.
VERT-X is being developed in two main phases. The first phase is already underway and will realise and test the most critical parts of the systems – the X-ray source assembly (including both the x-ray source and mirror), and the raster scan mechanism, including the tip/tilt metrology.
The second phase will develop the Thermal Vacuum Chamber together with the remaining elements of the testing system.
The facility is planned to be completed in 2025, with the intention that once it is launched, the ATHENA mirror assembly calibration tasks can be completely accomplished in just 6 months.
4000126229 has been initiated