A Compact Very High Resolution Camera (VHRC) for Earth and planetary exploration using a large array (7K X 8K) CCD

Abstract

A concept is presented of a compact and very light-weight camera system for Earth and planetary exploration realizing a panchromatic ground resolution of about 1 to 1.5 m per pixel from orbits of 500 to 800 km. Heart of the camera system is a new 7k x 8k Philips CCD (12 muem pixels) which allows a large field of view at the given veryhigh resolution. Using modern, properly taylored ceramic composite materials (C/C-SiC or C/SiC) for the primary and secondary, parts of the optical bench, and the mechanical structure, will - together with an extremly short optical design - limit the mass of the system (camera including CCD and detector electronics) to about 7 to 8 kg. Nevertheless, it may be an advantage to manufacture the whole opto- mechanical system (mirrors and optical bench from Zerodur which will slightly increase the mass. The main fields of application of the camera will be commercial remote sensing, e.g. for regional planning,or mobile communication modeling, military verification tasks, and geological surface studies and preparation of lander and rover missions on planetary exploration.