Abstract
GAIA (Global Astrometric Interferometer for Astrophysics) is one of the candidate missions for the 5th Cornerstone of the ESA Horizon 2000 programme. It is a high precision instrument dedicated to the global astrometric measurement of tens of millions of celestial objects at the 10-microarcsec level. The nominal launch date is planned for 2009 and observations will be performed from L2 location. In the framework of an advance technology study, conducted by Matra Marconi Space (MMS) for ESA, MMS have defined an instrumental concept, which should be able to fulfil the mission requirements. The detection function is based on a large focal plane paved with hundreds of large and high-performance CCDs operated in TDI mode. The GAIA focal plane is undoubtedly one of the most challenging focal planes which should be developed in the near future for space applications. Its concept is presented in this paper. In addition, the preliminary architecture of two other focal planes integrated to GAIA payload, one dedicated to spectroscopy and the second one to broadband photometry, will also be presented.
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