文档介绍：header for SPIE use
The Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF)
a b c d
James Fanson , Giovannie Fazio , Jamesf Houck , Tim Kellyf ,
e Rieke , Domenick Tenerelli , and Milt Whitten
a
Jet Propulsionb Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena CA 91109
Smithsonian cAstrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, MA 02138
d Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 14853
Ball Aerospacee and Technologies Corp., Boulder, CO 80301
f University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, 85721
Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space Co., Sunnyvale, CA 94089
ABSTRACT
This paper describes the design of the Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF) as the project enters the detailed design
phase. SIRTF is the fourth of NASA’s Great Observatories, and is scheduled for launch in December 2001. SIRTF provides
background limited imaging and spectroscopy covering the spectral range from 3 to 180 mm, complementing the capabilities
of the other Great Observatories – the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), the Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF),
and pton Gamma Ray Observatory (CGRO). SIRTF will be the first mission bine the high sensitivity
achievable from a cryogenic space telescope with the imaging and spectroscopic power of the new generation of infrared
detector arrays. The scientific capabilities of bination are so great that SIRTF was designated the highest priority
major mission for all of US astronomy in the 1990s.
Keywords: telescope, cryogenic, infrared, astronomy, astrophysics, Great Observatory
1. INTRODUCTION
The SIRTF mission has experienced dramatic evolution in both architecture and mission design. Originally conceived as a
low Earth orbiting observatory serviced by astronauts from the Space Shuttle, SIRTF passed through a phase in high Earth
orbit using first the Titan and later the smaller Atlas launch vehicle, to the current concept of a deep-space mission orbiting
the sun, and using the still smaller Delta launch vehicle. SIRTF features an 85 cm aper