European Space Agency detector development for space science: present and future activities

Abstract

We report on the present and future detector development activities for the European Space Agency Science Programme. The development of European technology in that field is a key enabler for the program, which requires TRL6 (ISO scale) by end of the definition phase, so called mission adoption. This is particularly true for Astronomy and fundamental physics type missions. Current activities are in particular targeting large format and p-channel CCD, NIR and MWIR, LWIR wavelength ranges as well as related ASIC controller. For the longer term future plan (so called M4, M5 and L2 missions, M3 being PLATO and L1 JUICE), the extreme ends of the spectrum will be addressed. An overview of the detector status for the Earth Observation program is given in appendix, as most of the technologies are directly applicable to some extent to science missions, in particular for Planetary missions. The specific validation activities in place in the future preparation office in support to the space science program will be eventually briefly detailed.