A cryogenic detector for submillimetre astronomy
Files
Date
1999
Authors
Gom, Bradley Gustav
University of Lethbridge. Faculty of Arts and Science
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Lethbridge, Alta. : University of Lethbridge, Faculty of Arts and Science, 1999
Abstract
Over the last several years, a submillimetre astronomical polarizing Fourier Transform Spectrometer (FTS) has been developed for use at the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) located atop Mauna Kea, Hawaii. A new liquid3 He cooled dual polarization detector system has been carefully designed for use with this FTS to eliminate noise problems encountered with UKT14, the JCMT facility bolometric detector. The objective of this thesis is to evaluate and optimize the performance of the new detector system. The design of the detector system is discussed, and the noise performance of the system is evaluated. The system performance is determined from photmetric, classical B-I, and spectroscopic measurements. Compared to UKT14, the intrinsic bolometer noise is reduced by a factor of - 2. More importantly, the spectral signal to noise ratio is improved by a factor of - 10 due to the elimination of electrical pickup and microphone noise in the detector signal.
Description
xiv, 156 leaves : ill. ; 28 cm.
Keywords
Fourier transform spectroscopy , Fourier transform spectroscopy -- Noise , Submillimeter astronomy , Dissertations, Academic