MTG Flexible Combined Imager optical design and performances

摘要

Meteosat Third Generation is the next ESA Program of Earth Observation dedicated to Nowcasting and very short term Weather Forecasting (NWC), medium/short range Global and Regional Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP), and Climate and Air Composition Monitoring. The satellites will be operating from the Geostationary orbit using a 3 axes stabilized platform. The main instrument is called the Flexible Combined Imager (FCI), currently under development by Thales Alenia Space France (TAS-F). This instrument will provide full images of the Earth every 10 minutes in 16 spectral channels between 0.44 and 13.3 μm, with a ground resolution from 0.5 km to 2 km. The FCI is composed of a TMA telescope developed by Kayser-Threde (KT), which includes a Scan mirror, and a calibration mechanism with an embedded black body dedicated to accurate in-flight IR radiometric calibration and a Metallic Neutral density for dedicated VNIR Sun calibration. The image produced by the telescope is split into several spectral groups by a spectral separation assembly (SSA) with dichroiec beamsplitters. The output beams are collimated to ease the instrument integration, and reach the cold optics (CO-Ⅰ) which focalize the optical beams onto the detectors. The cold optics and IR detectors are accurately positioned inside a common cryostat to improve registration between spectral channels. Spectral filters are integrated on top of the detectors in order to achieve the required spectral selection. This article will describe the optical design and the main optical performances of the FCI : image quality, very high line-of-sight stability, and an efficient stray-light rejection thanks to the implementation of dedicated baffles and a stringent control of contamination. The FCI currently under development is expected to exhibit a significant improvement of performances with respect to Meteosat Second Generation satellites.