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Current research on space-based exploration for the ionosphere needs more advanced
technologies. Because the spectral signals in the ionosphere distributing basically in the farultraviolet
waveband are very weak. Usual spectrometer structures and detectors such as CCD can't
receive enough information. Based on this principle of atmospheric sounding, the imaging
spectrometer prototype for ionosphere detection application was designed to solve the problem. This
prototype consists of the telescope and the imaging spectrometer. The simple structure and small
number of mirrors can help higher transmission efficiency be achieved and weak signals detection be
implemented. The telescope is an off-axis parabolic mirror and the spectrometer is a modified
Czerny-Turner spectral imaging system. Modified Czerny-Turner spectrometer contains a spherical
mirror, a fixed plane grating and a toroidal mirror. By adjusting the incident angle to the collimating
mirror and using toroidal mirror, coma and astigmatism were corrected well. We also optimize
distances between the grating to the focusing mirror and the focusing mirror to the image plane to
improve disadvantages of traditional Czerny-Turner structure. Designed results demonstrate that
aberrations are substantially corrected, and high image quality can be obtained in broad waveband.
The photon counting Wedge-Strip-Anode detector with micro-channel planes as the receiving plane
is accepted for the instrument prototype. The other photon counting 2-D detector responding well for
weak light such as Cross-Delay line detector and MAMA detector can also be used for detection.
The calibration and performances testing system is made of a vacuum system, a deuterium lamp, a
monochrometer and the instrument prototype. Results obtained from the experiment show that the
spectral resolution is 2.4 nm and the spatial resolution is 80 μm. The other calibration experiments
are running. The technology of the spectrometer prototype is important for the research and
applications of ionosphere remote sensing.
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