Compact, Low-cost Long Wave Infrared Hyperspectral Sensor for Spacecraft

Existing Air Force sensors on space platform are large and expensive, limiting the number of sensor which can be deployed, leaving them vulnerable to attacks. By deploying sensors on a swarm of small satellites, each with a compact, low-cost sensor, this weakness can be obviated as (1) the sensors are now expendable due to their low-cost (2) the presence of other sensors in a swarm will mitigate the loss of performance if a few are rendered obsolete. To enable this goal, continuing technical evolution in electro-optical/Infrared (EO/IR) component development and system design will be leveraged, with continued decreases in sensor-level size, weight, power and cost (SWAP-C) over the past 40 years. In particular focal plane arrays (FPAs) have seen dramatic gains in performance without concomitant increases in cost. Accordingly, military qualified microbolometer based cameras with large formats are now available commercially from a variety of vendors. These high performance, low-cost sensors will be leveraged for the development of a compact, low-cost hyperspectral sensor suitable for small spacecraft.