A large-format focal plane for soft X-ray spectroscopy

The Rocket for Extended-source X-ray Spectroscopy (tREXS) is a sub-orbital rocket payload, launched in September 2022, that targets a large field-of-view spectroscopic observation of the Cygnus Loop supernova remnant. TREXS mechanically focuses X-rays onto a co-aligned array of reflection gratings, dispersing the incident X-rays onto a focal plane camera. The focal plane camera of this instrument is required to cover a large area (373.5 mm x 73.7 mm), have a good quantum efficiency across the CVI to OVIII energy range (368 eV to 654 eV), and survive the high-stress environment of a sub-orbital rocket launch. The detector that was chosen to populate the focal plane was the Teledyne e2v CIS113-Vega, due to its high quantum efficiency, large area, buttable design, simplicity, and low cost.

This poster will discuss the design of this camera system, it’s build-up and integration in the payload, the performance during flight, and post-flight calibration results.