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ISOPHOT
is one of the four focal plane instruments (ISOPHOT, ISOCAM,
LWS, SWS) of the European Space Agency (ESA)'s Infrared Space
Observatory (ISO). ISO was the first versatile infrared
space observatory, allowing diffraction limited imaging and
spectroscopy and it opened a new wavelength region in the far
infrared (110…240 µm). ISO was cooled by 2300 litres
of superfluid helium to a temperature near absolute zero (-273°C).
It achieved a sensitivity 100 times better than the exploring
IRAS-mission in the year 1983. ISO's scientific goals were the
exploration of the cold and dust hidden universe as well as
the spectroscopic analysis of the interstellar and circumstellar
matter.
ISOPHOT
is an imaging photopolarimeter for the wavelength range 2.5
... 240 µm and includes a low-resolution spectrometer
for the 2.5 ... 12 µm range. ISO was launched on 17 November
1995 into a highly excentric 24h orbit with an apogee at 70
000 km well outside the earth's radiation belts. The mission
ended on 08 April 1998; data were gained for 29 months, 11 months
longer than originally predicted. More information on the mission
is found on the ISO facts page of ESA.
ISOPHOT
was designed and built by a consortium of various science institutes
and industrial enterprises in Europe under the leadership of
the Principal Investigator (PI), Prof. Dietrich Lemke at the
Max-Planck-Institut für Astronomie (MPIA). For more information
on the ISOPHOT instrument, its observing modes, the calibration,
the data reduction and the data products see The
ISO Handbook, Volume IV: PHT - The Imaging Photo-Polarimeter.
The observations
ranged from comets and dust in the solar system to deep surveys
of galaxies in the young universe. In April 2002, i.e. 4 years
after the end of the ISO-mission about 30% of the scientific
data obtained had been reduced. This resulted in 770 papers
in journals with referee system and more than 1000 conference
contributions. More scientific impact from the huge data base
can be expected within the next few years by "archive observations"
during
"ISO's Active Archive Phase". ISO's
Legacy Archive is open to all astronomers.
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MPIA
delivered the ISOPHOT-Instrument to Europe's ISO-Satellite.
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