The NIST EOS Thermal-Infrared Transfer Radiometer

Published

August 1, 1998

Author(s)

Joseph P. Rice, Bettye C. Johnson

Abstract

A portable thermal infrared transfer radiometer (TXR) has been developed for use in comparisons and scale verifications of sources used to calibrate thermal- infrared (TIR) channels of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's) Earth Observing System (EOS) flight instruments. The TXR is designed to measure the radiance temperature of large-area black-body sources in cryogenic vacuum environments, either at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) or at the EOS instrument-calibration facilities. It can be operated in ambient conditions of room temperature and pressure, or in EOS instrument thermal/vacuum chambers at temperatures as low as 77K. The TXR is a liquid-nitrogen-cooled filter radiometer with two channels: one centered at 5 [mu]m based on a photovoltaic InSb detector, and the other centered at 10 [mu]m based on a photovoltaic HgCdTe(MCT) detector. The spectral, spatial and temporal characterization of the TXR using state of the art NIST ambient IR instrumentation will be reported.

Citation

Metrologia

Volume

35

Issue

4

Pub Type

Journals

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Local Download

Keywords

blackbody, Earth Observing System, electro-optics, infrared, radiometer, transfer standard

Citation

Rice, J. and Johnson, B. (1998), The NIST EOS Thermal-Infrared Transfer Radiometer, Metrologia, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=841262 (Accessed October 14, 2025)