Cooling device for mercury-cadmium-telluride detector for infra-red radiation, e.g. for metrology, using Peltier element coupled between interior of cooling medium container and detector

摘要

The cooling device has a cooling medium container (10) and a thermoelectric element (32), in heat conductive coupling with the interior of the container and the detector (30) at opposite ends and supplied with current via a controlled current source (56), dependent on the difference between the actual detector temperature and the required detector temperature. The thermoelectric element is provided by a Peltier element, an analysis device (60) detecting the supplied current, for detecting the time point at which the cooling medium is exhausted by extrapolation of the current characteristic. An independent claim for a method for cooling a detector for IR radiation is also included.