ann15042 — Zprávy
Revolutionary New High-speed Infrared Detector Sees First Light
15. června 2015: The first prototype of a new generation of fast and very sensitive detectors has been successfully installed on the PIONIER instrument at ESO’s Paranal Observatory. This achievement is the result of five years of sustained collaboration and effort from academic institutes (LETI, ONERA, IPAG, LAM) and industrial partners (SOFRADIR). As its name suggests, the new RAPID system [1] delivers several thousand images per second and can operate at very low light levels. These capabilities, unique for an infrared detector, are crucial for many applications, ranging from fundamental science to medicine. In astronomy, it will boost the performance of adaptive optics, a technology at the heart of the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). Unlike most of the commercially available detectors, RAPID can spot photons (light particles) of both visible and infrared light (wavelengths from 0.4–3.6 micrometres). This is a tremendous gain; the increased spectral coverage means that far more photons can ...