Extremely Accurate Star Tracker SBIR Phase II

During Phase I, IERUS Technologies and the University of Alabama in Huntsville teamed to transition the focal plane metrology technique developed by the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL).  The technique enables the location of pixels in a focal plane array to high precision. This technique, combined with a precision telescope, was shown to measure the the location of stars on the focal plane to better than 100 milli-arc-seconds.  Thermal analysis indicated that the anticipated environment would not degrade the accuracy beyond this limit.  Optical analysis showed the nominal design would provide diffraction limited performance.  The projected size is consistent with existing compact star trackers (1300 cc, < 1 kg). During Phase II, the team will develop a breadboard version of the design, including the optics, imaging system, and processing to extract star locations.