Soft X-ray Imager aboard Hitomi (ASTRO-H)

Abstract

The Soft X-ray Imager (SXI) is an imaging spectrometer using charge-coupled devices (CCDs) aboard the Hitomi X-ray observatory. The SXI sensor has four CCDs with an imaging area size of $31\mathrm{mm}\times 31\mathrm{mm}$ arranged in a $2\times 2$ array. Combined with the X-ray mirror, the Soft X-ray Telescope, the SXI detects X-rays between $0.4\mathrm{keV}$ and $12\mathrm{keV}$ and covers a $38^{\prime }\times 38^{\prime }$ field-of-view. The CCDs are P-channel fully-depleted, back-illumination type with a depletion layer thickness of $200\mu \mathrm{m}$. Low operation temperature down to $-120{}^{\circ }\mathrm{C}$ as well as charge injection is employed to reduce the charge transfer inefficiency of the CCDs. The functionality and performance of the SXI are verified in on-ground tests. The energy resolution measured is $161$-$170\mathrm{eV}$ in full width at half maximum for $5.9\mathrm{keV}$ X-rays. In the tests, we found that the CTI of some regions are significantly higher. A method is developed to properly treat the position-dependent CTI. Another problem we found is pinholes in the Al coating on the incident surface of the CCDs for optical light blocking. The Al thickness of the contamination blocking filter is increased in order to sufficiently block optical light.

arXiv comment28 pages, 23 figures, 3 tables, accepted for publication in JATIS

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• Single event effect characterization of the mixed-signal ASIC developed for CCD camera in space use
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Cited by in corpus (14)

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• Hitomi X-ray Observation of the Pulsar Wind Nebula G21.5$-$0.9
• Experimental studies on the charge transfer inefficiency of CCD developed for the soft X-ray imaging telescope Xtend aboard the XRISM satellite
• Glimpse of the highly obscured HMXB IGR J16318-4848 with Hitomi
• Xtend, the Soft X-ray Imaging Telescope for the X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission (XRISM)
• Optical Blocking Performance of CCDs Developed for the X-ray Astronomy Satellite XRISM
• Evaluation of Kyoto's Event-Driven X-ray Astronomical SOI Pixel Sensor with a Large Imaging Area
• Spectral Break of Energetic Pulsar Wind Nebulae Detected with Wideband X-ray Observations
• Radiation hardness of a p-channel notch CCD developed for the X-ray CCD camera onboard the XRISM satellite
• Subpixel Response of SOI Pixel Sensor for X-ray Astronomy with Pinned Depleted Diode: First Result from Mesh Experiment
• Design study and spectroscopic performance of SOI pixel detector with a pinned depleted diode structure for X-ray astronomy
• A Chronological History of X-Ray Astronomy Missions
• A detailed study on spectroscopic performance of SOI pixel detector with a pinned depleted diode structure for X-ray astronomy