J. M. Rutherford

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

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E. Figueroa‐Feliciano

Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory

S. N. Trowbridge

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

F. S. Porter

Goddard Space Flight Center

D. McCammon

University of Wisconsin–Madison

P. Wikus

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

C. A. Kilbourne

Goddard Space Flight Center

S. W. Leman

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Megan E. Eckart

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

W. B. Doriese

National Institute of Standards and Technology

J. S. Adams

Goddard Space Flight Center

Cooperative Institutions

Goddard Space Flight Center

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

National Institute of Standards and Technology

Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology

Northwestern University

Center for Astrophysics Harvard & Smithsonian

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

University of Maryland, College Park

Stanford University

Deleted Institution

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Advanced technology Tilt Wing study

Guidance, Navigation, and Control Conference (1992)

J. M. Rutherford Steven Bass

10.2514/6.1992-4237

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Citations (9)

The Detector and Readout Systems of the Micro-X High Resolution Microcalorimeter X-Ray Imaging Rocket

AIP conference proceedings (2009)

P. Wikus W. B. Doriese Megan E. Eckart J. S. Adams S. R. Bandler

The Micro‐X sounding rocket experiment will deploy an imaging transition‐edge‐sensor (TES) microcalorimeter spectrometer to observe astrophysical sources in the 0.2–3.0 keV band. The instrument has been designed at a systems level, and the first items of flight hardware are presently being built. In the first flight, planned for January 2011, the spectrometer will observe a recently discovered Silicon knot in the Puppis‐A supernova remnant. Here we describe the design of the Micro‐X science instrument, focusing on the instrument's detector and detector assembly. The current design of the 2‐dimensional spectrometer array contains 128 close‐packed pixels with a pitch of 600 μm. The conically approximated Wolter‐1 mirror will map each of these pixels to a 0.95 arcmin region on the sky; the field of view will be 11.4 arcmin. Targeted energy resolution of the TESs is about 2 eV over the full observing band. A SQUID time‐division multiplexer (TDM) will read out the array. The detector time constants will be engineered to approximately 2 ms to match the TDM, which samples each pixel at 32.6 kHz, limited only by the telemetry system of the rocket. The detector array and two SQUID stages of the TDM readout system are accommodated in a lightweight Mg enclosure, which is mounted to the 50 mK stage of an adiabatic demagnetization refrigerator. A third SQUID amplification stage is located on the 1.6 K liquid He stage of the cryostat. An on‐board 55‐Fe source will fluoresce a Ca target, providing 3.69 and 4.01 keV calibration lines that will not interfere with the scientifically interesting energy band.

Sounding rocket

Large format

Cryostat

Rocket (weapon)

10.1063/1.3292371

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The Cassiopeia A Ejecta Knots: Evolution Studies and New Plasma Diagnostics

HEAD (2011)

S. N. Trowbridge J. M. Rutherford E. Figueroa‐Feliciano Dan P. Dewey Fabienne A. Bastien

Cassiopeia A

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Vibration Isolation Design for the Micro-X Rocket Payload

Journal of Low Temperature Physics (2013)

Sarah Heine E. Figueroa‐Feliciano J. M. Rutherford P. Wikus P. Oakley

Sounding rocket

Payload (computing)

Rocket (weapon)

Isolation

10.1007/s10909-013-1032-1

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The Micro-X Imaging X-Ray Microcalorimeter Sounding Rocket Payload: Final Design and Performance Tests

AAS/High Energy Astrophysics Division #12 (2011)

J. M. Rutherford

Sounding rocket

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Rocket (weapon)

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Searching for keV Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter with X-ray Microcalorimeter Sounding Rockets

arXiv (Cornell University) (2015)

E. Figueroa‐Feliciano A. J. Anderson Daniel Castro D. C. Goldfinger J. M. Rutherford

High-resolution X-ray spectrometers onboard suborbital sounding rockets can search for dark matter candidates that produce X-ray lines, such as decaying keV-scale sterile neutrinos. Even with exposure times and effective areas far smaller than XMM-Newton and Chandra observations, high-resolution, wide field-of-view observations with sounding rockets have competitive sensitivity to decaying sterile neutrinos. We analyze a subset of the 2011 observation by the X-ray Quantum Calorimeter instrument centered on Galactic coordinates l = 165, b = -5 with an effective exposure of 106 seconds, obtaining a limit on the sterile neutrino mixing angle of sin^2(2 theta) < 7.2e-10 at 95% CL for a 7 keV neutrino. Better sensitivity at the level of sin^2(2 theta) ~ 2.1e-11 at 95\% CL for a 7 keV neutrino is achievable with future 300-second observations of the galactic center by the Micro-X instrument, providing a definitive test of the sterile neutrino interpretation of the reported 3.56 keV excess from galaxy clusters.

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THE ADIABATIC DEMAGNETIZATION REFRIGERATOR FOR THE MICRO-X SOUNDING ROCKET TELESCOPE

AIP conference proceedings (2010)

P. Wikus J. S. Adams Yelena Bagdasarova S. R. Bandler W. B. Doriese

The Micro‐X Imaging X‐ray Spectrometer is a sounding rocket payload slated for launch in 2011. An array of Transition Edge Sensors, which is operated at a bath temperature of 50 mK, will be used to obtain a high resolution spectrum of the Puppis‐A supernova remnant. An Adiabatic Demagnetization Refrigerator (ADR) with a 75 gram Ferric Ammonium Alum (FAA) salt pill in the bore of a 4 T superconducting magnet provides a stable heat sink for the detector array only a few seconds after burnout of the rocket motors. This requires a cold stage design with very short thermal time constants. A suspension made from Kevlar strings holds the 255 gram cold stage in place. It is capable of withstanding loads in excess of 200 g. Stable operation of the TES array in proximity to the ADR magnet is ensured by a three‐stage magnetic shielding system which consists of a superconducting can, a high‐permeability shield and a bucking coil. The development and testing of the Micro‐X payload is well underway.

Shields

Sounding rocket

Transition edge sensor

10.1063/1.3422413

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Micro-X, the TES X-ray Imaging Rocket: First Year Progress

IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity (2009)

P. Wikus J. M. Rutherford J. S. Adams Yelena Bagdasarova S. R. Bandler

Micro-X is a sounding-rocket experiment that will combine a transition edge sensor (TES) microcalorimeter array with an imaging mirror to obtain high-spectral-resolution images of astronomical X-ray sources. The instrument's resolution across the 0.3-2.5 keV band will be 2 eV. The first flight will target the region of the Bright Eastern Knot of the Puppis A supernova remnant and is slated for January 2011. The obtained high-resolution X-ray spectra will be used to ascertain the temperature and ionization state of the X-ray-emitting gas and to determine its velocity structure. The TES array is read out by a time-division superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID) multiplexing system. The detector front end assembly and the SQUID multiplexing circuit are cooled to the operating temperature of 50 mK with an adiabatic demagnetization refrigerator (ADR). The design of this refrigerator is tailored to the requirements of rocket flight. Stable operation of the TES array close to the ADR magnet will be achieved with a magnetic shielding system, which will be based on a combination of a bucking coil and high-permeability and superconducting shield materials to cancel out residual fields. We describe our progress in developing the Micro-X instrument.

Sounding rocket

Transition edge sensor

X-ray detector

10.1109/tasc.2009.2019129

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The sun as a test source for boresight calibration of microwave antennas

IRE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation (1971)

W. Graf R. N. Bracewell J. Deuter J. M. Rutherford

Although the diameter of the sun at microwavelengths is a little over half a degree, the sun can be used for establishing, say between 3 and 30 cm, the pointing corrections (boresight calibration) of microwave antennas, with high precision. There is, however, a discrepancy between the position of the microwave sun on any given day and the position of the center of the solar disc as tabulated in [16]. Over the period 1966-1969 this discrepancy had an rms value of 1.6' east-west and 1.2' north-south and a range of 11.4' east-west and 9.2' north-south. These conclusions are based on sun maps, made at 9.1 cm with an antenna having a beamwidth of approximately 3', which are published regularly. From such a map the microwave centroid can be determined with an error less than 1'. In the absence of such a map, the centroid can be estimated to within 2' or slightly better by taking account of optical data such as sunspots or plages. The correction on any one day is strongly correlated with that of the day before, but the correlation is small after about 5 days. The correlation returns in part after 27 days.

Beamwidth

Centroid

Microwave radiometer

Sunspot

Position (finance)

10.1109/tap.1971.1139996

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Citations (5)

Imaging X-ray spectroscopy with micro-X and Chandra

J. M. Rutherford

X-Ray Spectroscopy

Imaging Spectroscopy

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Citations (1)