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From: cmpbsdb@gitpyr.UUCP (Don Barry)
Newsgroups: net.astro,net.astro.expert
Subject: Image Intensifiers
Message-ID: <805@gitpyr.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 20-Sep-85 11:14:31 EDT
Article-I.D.: gitpyr.805
Posted: Fri Sep 20 11:14:31 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 21-Sep-85 04:46:00 EDT
Organization: Georgia Institute of Technology
Lines: 34
Xref: watmath net.astro:996 net.astro.expert:170

In 1969, the Atlanta Fernbank Science Center acquired what was then
the last word in image intensifier equipment from NASA in order to
successfully undertake the optical tracking of one of the Apollo  
capsules to the moon.  (I believe this was successful until the
object was lost in the glare of the moon, but all objectives were
met).  Some of you may remember this being broadcast on Huntley/Brinkley
news from Atlanta live over NBC.  

I have unpacked this equipment which has not been used in some time
in order to make videotaping of telescopic views possible for the
local media and also to allow quick photography by the high school
students that use our facilities.  We have a 36" Ritchey-Chretien
scope with effective f/16.  My question is this:

   Our old intensification equipment is still in very good condition,
but when used at prime focus, the ca. 1" active area only accepts 
20' of field.  The current generation of microchannel intensifiers
have larger active areas, but I don't know which suppliers I should
contact, or how much much we should budget for one.  What is
their performance (Photon sensitivity, gain, etc) relative to
the old vidicon based units?  Our current unit shows the central
star in the ring nebula (mag 14.?) easily on an attached hi-res vidicon.
If anyone out there is an expert on this, I'd appreciate it if you'd
send me a list of suppliers of this equipment, and any specs you can
find.  How large an active area on a microchannel plate can you
get?  How much do the various technologies cost?

 
-- 

Don Barry (Chemistry Dept)          CSnet: cmpbsdb%gitpyr.GTNET@gatech.CSNET
Georgia Institute of Technology    BITNET: CMPBSDB @ GITVM1
Atlanta, GA 30332      ARPA: cmpbsdb%gitpyr.GTNET%gatech.CSNET@csnet-relay.ARPA 
UUCP: ...!{akgua,allegra,amd,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo,ut-ngp}!gatech!gitpyr!cmpbsdb


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