Planck pre-launch status: calibration of the Low Frequency Instrument flight model radiometers
Abstract
The Low Frequency Instrument (LFI) on-board the ESA Planck satellite carries eleven radiometer subsystems, called Radiometer Chain Assemblies (RCAs), each composed of a pair of pseudo-correlation receivers. We describe the on-ground calibration campaign performed to qualify the flight model RCAs and to measure their pre-launch performances. Each RCA was calibrated in a dedicated flight-like cryogenic environment with the radiometer front-end cooled to 20K and the back-end at 300K, and with an external input load cooled to 4K. A matched load simulating a blackbody at different temperatures was placed in front of the sky horn to derive basic radiometer properties such as noise temperature, gain, and noise performance, e.g. 1/f noise. The spectral response of each detector was measured as was their susceptibility to thermal variation. All eleven LFI RCAs were calibrated. Instrumental parameters measured in these tests, such as noise temperature, bandwidth, radiometer isolation, and linearity, provide essential inputs to the Planck-LFI data analysis.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1005.2541,
title = {Planck pre-launch status: calibration of the Low Frequency Instrument flight model radiometers},
author = {F. Villa and L. Terenzi and M. Sandri and P. Meinhold and T. Poutanen and P. Battaglia and C. Franceschet and N. Hughes and M. Laaninen and P. Lapolla and M. Bersanelli and R. C. Butler and F. Cuttaia and O. D'Arcangelo and M. Frailis and E. Franceschi and S. Galeotta and A. Gregorio and R. Leonardi and S. R. Lowe and N. Mandolesi and M. Maris and L. Mendes and A. Mennella and G. Morgante and L. Stringhetti and M. Tomasi and L. Valenziano and A. Zacchei and A. Zonca and B. Aja and E. Artal and M. Balasini and T. Bernardino and E. Blackhurst and L. Boschini and B. Cappellini and F. Cavaliere and A. Colin and F. Colombo and R. J. Davis and L. De La Fuente and J. Edgeley and T. Gaier and A. Galtress and R. Hoyland and P. Jukkala and D. Kettle and V-H. Kilpia and C. R. Lawrence and D. Lawson and J. P. Leahy and P. Leutenegger and S. Levin and D. Maino and M. Malaspina and A. Mediavilla and M. Miccolis and L. Pagan and J. P. Pascual and F. Pasian and M. Pecora and M. Pospieszalski and N. Roddis and M. J. Salmon and M. Seiffert and R. Silvestri and A. Simonetto and P. Sjoman and C. Sozzi and J. Tuovinen and J. Varis and A. Wilkinson and F. Winder},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1005.2541},
year = {2015}
}
Comments
15 pages, 18 figures. Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics