8 research outputs found
FIREBALL: Detector, data acquisition and reduction
The Faint Intergalactic Redshifted Emission Balloon (FIREBALL) had its first scientific flight in June 2009. The instrument combines microchannel plate detector technology with fiber-fed integral field spectroscopy on an unstable stratospheric balloon gondola platform. This unique combination poses a series of calibration and data reduction challenges that must be addressed and resolved to allow for accurate data analysis. We discuss our approach and some of the methods we are employing to accomplish this task
FIREBALL: Instrument pointing and aspect reconstruction
The Faint Intergalactic Redshifted Emission Balloon (FIREBALL) had its first scientific flight in June 2009. The instrument is a 1 meter class balloon-borne telescope equipped with a vacuum-ultraviolet integral field spectrograph intended to detect emission from the inter-galactic medium at redshifts 0.3 < z < 1.0. The scientific goals and the challenging environment place strict constraints on the pointing and tracking systems of the gondola. In this manuscript we briefly review our pointing requirements, discuss the methods and solutions used to meet those requirements, and present the aspect reconstruction results from the first successful scientific flight
FIREBALL: the Faint Intergalactic medium Redshifted Emission Balloon: overview and first science flight results
FIREBALL (the Faint Intergalactic Redshifted Emission Balloon) is a balloon-borne 1m telescope coupled to an ultraviolet fiber-fed spectrograph. FIREBALL is designed to study the faint and diffuse emission of the intergalactic medium, until now detected primarily in absorption. FIREBALL is a path finding mission to test new technology and make new constraints on the temperature and density of this gas. We report on the first successful science flight of FIREBALL, in June 2009, which proved every aspect of the complex instrument performance, and provided the strongest measurements and constraints on IGM emission available from any instrument
FIREBALL: the Faint Intergalactic medium Redshifted Emission Balloon: overview and first science flight results
FIREBALL (the Faint Intergalactic Redshifted Emission Balloon) is a balloon-borne 1m telescope coupled to an ultraviolet fiber-fed spectrograph. FIREBALL is designed to study the faint and diffuse emission of the intergalactic medium, until now detected primarily in absorption. FIREBALL is a path finding mission to test new technology and make new constraints on the temperature and density of this gas. We report on the first successful science flight of FIREBALL, in June 2009, which proved every aspect of the complex instrument performance, and provided the strongest measurements and constraints on IGM emission available from any instrument
FIREBall-2: advancing TRL while doing proof-of-concept astrophysics on a suborbital platform
Here we discuss advances in UV technology over the last decade, with an
emphasis on photon counting, low noise, high efficiency detectors in
sub-orbital programs. We focus on the use of innovative UV detectors in a NASA
astrophysics balloon telescope, FIREBall-2, which successfully flew in the Fall
of 2018. The FIREBall-2 telescope is designed to make observations of distant
galaxies to understand more about how they evolve by looking for diffuse
hydrogen in the galactic halo. The payload utilizes a 1.0-meter class telescope
with an ultraviolet multi-object spectrograph and is a joint collaboration
between Caltech, JPL, LAM, CNES, Columbia, the University of Arizona, and NASA.
The improved detector technology that was tested on FIREBall-2 can be applied
to any UV mission. We discuss the results of the flight and detector
performance. We will also discuss the utility of sub-orbital platforms (both
balloon payloads and rockets) for testing new technologies and proof-of-concept
scientific ideasComment: Submitted to the Proceedings of SPIE, Defense + Commercial Sensing
(SI19
FIREBall-2: The Faint Intergalactic Medium Redshifted Emission Balloon Telescope
The Faint Intergalactic Medium Redshifted Emission Balloon (FIREBall) is a
mission designed to observe faint emission from the circumgalactic medium of
moderate redshift (z~0.7) galaxies for the first time. FIREBall observes a
component of galaxies that plays a key role in how galaxies form and evolve,
likely contains a significant amount of baryons, and has only recently been
observed at higher redshifts in the visible. Here we report on the 2018 flight
of the FIREBall-2 Balloon telescope, which occurred on September 22nd, 2018
from Fort Sumner, New Mexico. The flight was the culmination of a complete
redesign of the spectrograph from the original FIREBall fiber-fed IFU to a
wide-field multi-object spectrograph. The flight was terminated early due to a
hole in the balloon, and our original science objectives were not achieved. The
overall sensitivity of the instrument and telescope was 90,000 LU, due
primarily to increased noise from stray light. We discuss the design of the
FIREBall-2 spectrograph, modifications from the original FIREBall payload, and
provide an overview of the performance of all systems. We were able to
successfully flight test a new pointing control system, a UV-optimized,
delta-doped and coated EMCCD, and an aspheric grating. The FIREBall-2 team is
rebuilding the payload for another flight attempt in the Fall of 2021, delayed
from 2020 due to COVID-19.Comment: 23 Pages, 14 Figures, Accepted for Publication in Ap
End-to-end ground calibration and in-flight performance of the FIREBall-2 instrument
International audienceThe payload of the Faint Intergalactic Redshifted Emission Balloon (FIREBall-2), the second generation of the FIREBall instrument (PI: C. Martin, Caltech), has been calibrated and launched from the NASA Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. FIREBall-2 was launched for the first time on the September 22, 2018, and the payload performed the very first multi-object acquisition from space using a multi-object spectrograph. Our performance-oriented paper presents the calibration and last ground adjustments of FIREBall-2, the in-flight performance assessed based on the flight data, and the predicted instrument's ultimate sensitivity. This analysis predicts that future flights of FIREBall-2 should be able to detect the HI Lyα resonance line in galaxies at z ∼ 0.67, but will find it challenging to spatially resolve the circumgalactic medium