XRISM Mission Status Update

The X-Ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission (XRISM), an international collaboration led by JAXA and involving major participation from NASA and ESA, will employ an advanced X-ray observatory with capabilities to carry out a science program to address some of the important questions of present-day astrophysics. XRISM is essentially a rebuild of the the Hitomi (Astro-H) spacecraft that was lost due to an operational mishap early in the mission in 2016, but only employs two of the original four instruments on Hitomi. The Resolve Soft X-ray Spectrometer is being developed jointly by a team led by NASA/GSFC and institutions in Japan under the direction of JAXA’s Institute of Space and Astronautical Science. It is a high-resolution, non-dispersive X-ray spectrometer operating between 0.3-12 keV. It is the core instrument on XRISM, providing a high-resolution spectroscopic capability (~ 5 eV) for the mission and covering the energy band where all astrophysically abundant elements have characteristic emission lines that can be used for a wide range of spectral studies of matter under extreme conditions. The target launch date for XRISM is May of 2023. In this talk, we will provide a general update on the status of the mission, as well as outline plans for “Early Release Science” targets. These will be a small handful of targets observed very early in the mission lifetime that will be made publicly available immediately, prior to the first XRISM General Observer Announcement of Opportunity. We anticipate that this first AO will be due approximately 5 months after launch, and will discuss the specifics of this call.