Impacts on the IXO observing efficiency
Publication date: 01 August 2010
Authors: Garcia, M., et al.
Journal: Proc. SPIE
Volume: 7732
Year: 2010
Copyright: SPIE
The International X-ray Observatory (IXO) has a top level requirement that the observing efficiency be 85%. This is a challenging requirement, given that the observing efficiencies for CXO and XMM-Newton are between 60% and 70%. However, the L2 orbit for IXO means that it will not be subject to the earth block/radiation zone effects that are seen for CXO and XMM-Newton. Outside of these effects the efficiencies for CXO and XMM-Newton do approach 85%, so this requirement appears achievable for IXO. In this paper we itemize the effects which impact the observing efficiency, in order to guide the design of the observatory. Meeting the 85% requirement should be possible but will require careful attention to detail.
This paper was presented at the SPIE conference on Astronomical Instrumentation 2010 conference.
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