The new data demonstrate that X-rays are not being warped by the clouds, but by the tremendous gravity of the black hole. Figure Scientists use these and other telescopes to estimate the rates at which black holes spin (Figure The sensors are placed in a 2 x 2 array with a minimal (~ 500 µm) gap between them to fill a total subtended FOV of 13 arcmin on a side (Figure After spacecraft commissioning, a one-time in-flight calibration of the observatory is performed to establish the launch shifts and the deployed position of the mast. • CdZnTe (Cadmium Zinc Telluride) detector technology. A sketch of the metrology system diagrammed with the mast and a single telescope is shown in Figure NuSTAR has made a number of coordinated observations of famous, bright X-ray sources like the Crab nebula, Hercules X-1, 3C 273 and IC 4329A.
By mapping titanium-44 in Cassiopeia A, astronomers get a direct look at what happened in the core of the star when it was blasted to smithereens. Using its unprecedented combination of sensitivity and spatial and spectral resolution, NuSTAR will pursue five primary scientific objectives:
The NuSTAR instrument is launched in a compact, stowed configuration, and after launch a 10 m mast is deployed to achieve a focal length of 10.15 m. Since the absolute deployment location of the mast is difficult to measure on the ground, due to complications associated with complete gravity off-loading, an adjustment mechanism is built into the last section of the mast to enable a one-time alignment to optimize the location of the optical axes on the focal plane. Deep and wide-field surveys in GOODS, COSMOS, XBootes
• Feb. 27, 2013: Two X-ray space observatories, NASA's NuSTAR and the ESA's XMM-Newton missions, have teamed up to measure definitively, for the first time, the spin rate of a black hole with a mass 2 million times that of our sun. Systems known as X-ray binaries, in which a compact object such as a neutron star or black hole feeds off a stellar companion, are also in the mix, along with the remnants of stellar blasts called supernovas. In February 2003, NASA issued an Explorer Program Announcement of Opportunity. NuSTAR is the first telescope capable of taking detailed pictures of the radioactive material in the Cassiopeia A supernova remnant. The mission's primary scientific goals are to conduct a deep survey for NuSTAR's predecessor, the High Energy Focusing Telescope (HEFT), was a balloon-borne version that carried telescopes and detectors constructed using similar technologies. Command uplinks and data downlinks will be through a ground station, operated by ASI (Agenzia Spaziale Italiana), located in Malindi, Kenya. NuSTAR is the eleventh mission of NASA's Small Explorer satellite program (SMEX-11) and the first space-based direct-imaging X-ray telescope at energies beyond those of the Chandra X-ray Observatory and XMM-Newton.It was successfully launched on 13 June 2012, having previously been delayed from 21 March due to software issues with the launch vehicle.
With NuSTAR's complementary data, astronomers can start to home in on the black holes' mysterious properties. The pointing strategy will emphasize long observations of survey fields, specific pointed observations and targets of opportunity. NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array) NuSTAR is a NASA-funded SMEX (Small Explorer) mission that carries the first focusing hard X-ray (5 - 80 keV) telescope to orbit.NuSTAR will offer a factor 50 - 100 sensitivity improvement compared to previous collimated or coded mask imagers that have operated in this energy band. During spacecraft operations, the positions of the laser beams on the PSD detectors are continually recorded at a frequency much higher than the mast oscillations. RF communications: There will be daily downlinks via TDRSS, and uplinks will not be routinely required. Mission and science operations have settled down into a mostly predictable daily routine, and the science team is making good progress toward achieving the primary, or "Level 1," science goals. Take …
This mechanism provides two angular adjustments as well as rotation. The June launch came almost three months after a planned early March launch date. One particular innovation enabling NuSTAR is that these shells are coated with The expected point spread function for the flight mirrors is 43 arc-seconds, giving a spot size of about two millimeters at the focal plane; this is unprecedentedly good resolution for focusing hard X-ray optics, though it is about one hundred times worse than the best resolution achieved at longer wavelengths by the Each focusing optic has its own focal plane module, consisting of a solid state CZT detectors are state-of-the-art room temperature NuSTAR has demonstrated its versatility, opening the way to many new discoveries in a wide variety of areas of astrophysical research since its launch. Only these 3 DOFs (Degree of Freedom) have the potential to introduce errors large enough that they must be measured. Therefore, since, 1) the laser are interchangeable, 2) since no laser diode illustrates any signs of superiority over the other and 3) it is more likely that one laser will survive if 2 different equally reliable lasers are chosen, a project decision was made to fly one laser diode from each vendor on the NuSTAR metrology system (Ref. NuSTAR will help solve this puzzle. This is done by observing a bright X-ray source (with known celestial coordinates), and simultaneously logging the star tracker data, the laser metrology data and the X-ray detector data. At the nominal faint-source count rates, the readout dead time is < 2%. This particular black hole was chosen as a first target because it is extremely bright in X-rays, allowing the NuSTAR team to easily see where the telescope's focused X-rays are falling on the detectors. Since the science operations began on August 1, 2012, the NuSTAR team has wrestled with learning to point the telescope's flexible system of optics, mast, spacecraft bus and solar array. The spacers are bonded to the Titanium mandrel and to the glass layers by means of a low outgassing epoxy (Henkel F131).
By mapping titanium-44 in Cassiopeia A, astronomers get a direct look at what happened in the core of the star when it was blasted to smithereens. Using its unprecedented combination of sensitivity and spatial and spectral resolution, NuSTAR will pursue five primary scientific objectives:
The NuSTAR instrument is launched in a compact, stowed configuration, and after launch a 10 m mast is deployed to achieve a focal length of 10.15 m. Since the absolute deployment location of the mast is difficult to measure on the ground, due to complications associated with complete gravity off-loading, an adjustment mechanism is built into the last section of the mast to enable a one-time alignment to optimize the location of the optical axes on the focal plane. Deep and wide-field surveys in GOODS, COSMOS, XBootes
• Feb. 27, 2013: Two X-ray space observatories, NASA's NuSTAR and the ESA's XMM-Newton missions, have teamed up to measure definitively, for the first time, the spin rate of a black hole with a mass 2 million times that of our sun. Systems known as X-ray binaries, in which a compact object such as a neutron star or black hole feeds off a stellar companion, are also in the mix, along with the remnants of stellar blasts called supernovas. In February 2003, NASA issued an Explorer Program Announcement of Opportunity. NuSTAR is the first telescope capable of taking detailed pictures of the radioactive material in the Cassiopeia A supernova remnant. The mission's primary scientific goals are to conduct a deep survey for NuSTAR's predecessor, the High Energy Focusing Telescope (HEFT), was a balloon-borne version that carried telescopes and detectors constructed using similar technologies. Command uplinks and data downlinks will be through a ground station, operated by ASI (Agenzia Spaziale Italiana), located in Malindi, Kenya. NuSTAR is the eleventh mission of NASA's Small Explorer satellite program (SMEX-11) and the first space-based direct-imaging X-ray telescope at energies beyond those of the Chandra X-ray Observatory and XMM-Newton.It was successfully launched on 13 June 2012, having previously been delayed from 21 March due to software issues with the launch vehicle.
With NuSTAR's complementary data, astronomers can start to home in on the black holes' mysterious properties. The pointing strategy will emphasize long observations of survey fields, specific pointed observations and targets of opportunity. NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array) NuSTAR is a NASA-funded SMEX (Small Explorer) mission that carries the first focusing hard X-ray (5 - 80 keV) telescope to orbit.NuSTAR will offer a factor 50 - 100 sensitivity improvement compared to previous collimated or coded mask imagers that have operated in this energy band. During spacecraft operations, the positions of the laser beams on the PSD detectors are continually recorded at a frequency much higher than the mast oscillations. RF communications: There will be daily downlinks via TDRSS, and uplinks will not be routinely required. Mission and science operations have settled down into a mostly predictable daily routine, and the science team is making good progress toward achieving the primary, or "Level 1," science goals. Take …
This mechanism provides two angular adjustments as well as rotation. The June launch came almost three months after a planned early March launch date. One particular innovation enabling NuSTAR is that these shells are coated with The expected point spread function for the flight mirrors is 43 arc-seconds, giving a spot size of about two millimeters at the focal plane; this is unprecedentedly good resolution for focusing hard X-ray optics, though it is about one hundred times worse than the best resolution achieved at longer wavelengths by the Each focusing optic has its own focal plane module, consisting of a solid state CZT detectors are state-of-the-art room temperature NuSTAR has demonstrated its versatility, opening the way to many new discoveries in a wide variety of areas of astrophysical research since its launch. Only these 3 DOFs (Degree of Freedom) have the potential to introduce errors large enough that they must be measured. Therefore, since, 1) the laser are interchangeable, 2) since no laser diode illustrates any signs of superiority over the other and 3) it is more likely that one laser will survive if 2 different equally reliable lasers are chosen, a project decision was made to fly one laser diode from each vendor on the NuSTAR metrology system (Ref. NuSTAR will help solve this puzzle. This is done by observing a bright X-ray source (with known celestial coordinates), and simultaneously logging the star tracker data, the laser metrology data and the X-ray detector data. At the nominal faint-source count rates, the readout dead time is < 2%. This particular black hole was chosen as a first target because it is extremely bright in X-rays, allowing the NuSTAR team to easily see where the telescope's focused X-rays are falling on the detectors. Since the science operations began on August 1, 2012, the NuSTAR team has wrestled with learning to point the telescope's flexible system of optics, mast, spacecraft bus and solar array. The spacers are bonded to the Titanium mandrel and to the glass layers by means of a low outgassing epoxy (Henkel F131).