Gaia basic angle monitoring system

W. Gielesen; D. de Bruijn; T. van den Dool; F. Kamphues; J. Mekking; B. Calvel; A. Laborie; C. Coatantiec; S. Touzeau; M. Erdmann; P. Gare; D. Monteiro

doi:10.1117/12.2026928

27 September 2013 Gaia basic angle monitoring system

W. Gielesen, D. de Bruijn, T. van den Dool, F. Kamphues, J. Mekking, B. Calvel, A. Laborie, C. Coatantiec, S. Touzeau, M. Erdmann, P. Gare, D. Monteiro

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 8863, Cryogenic Optical Systems and Instruments 2013; 88630G (2013) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2026928
Event: SPIE Optical Engineering + Applications, 2013, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

The Gaia mission¹ will create an extraordinarily precise three-dimensional map of more than one billion stars in our Galaxy. The Gaia spacecraft², built by EADS Astrium, is part of ESA's Cosmic Vision programme and scheduled for launch in 2013. Gaia measures the position, distance and motion of stars with an accuracy of 24 micro-arcsec using two telescopes at a fixed mutual angle of 106.5°, named the ‘Basic Angle’, at an operational temperature of 100 K. This accuracy requires ultra-high stability at cryogenic conditions, which can only be achieved by using Silicon Carbide for both the optical bench and the telescopes. TNO has developed, built and space qualified the Silicon carbide Basic Angle Monitoring (BAM) on-board metrology system³ for this mission, measuring the relative motion of Gaia’s telescopes with accuracies in the range of 0.5 micro-arcsec. This is achieved by a system of two laser interferometers able to detect Optical Path Differences (OPD) as small as 1.5 picometer rms. Following a general introduction on Gaia and the use of Silicon Carbide as base material this paper addresses the specific challenges towards the cryogenic application of the Gaia BAM including design, integration and verification/qualification by testing.

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W. Gielesen, D. de Bruijn, T. van den Dool, F. Kamphues, J. Mekking, B. Calvel, A. Laborie, C. Coatantiec, S. Touzeau, M. Erdmann, P. Gare, and D. Monteiro "Gaia basic angle monitoring system", Proc. SPIE 8863, Cryogenic Optical Systems and Instruments 2013, 88630G (27 September 2013); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2026928

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