Herschel–SPIRE: an update on performance and plans

Abstract

SPIRE, the Spectral and Photometric Imaging Receiver, is Herschel’s submillimetre camera and spectrometer. It comprises a three-band imaging photometer operating at 250, 350 and 500 μm, and an imaging Fourier Transform Spectrometer (FTS) covering 194–671 μm. The instrument design and its in-flight performance, calibration and data processing are outlined by Griffin et al. (2010) and Swinyard et al. (2010) in the Astronomy & Astrophysics special issue on first results from Herschel. Here we provide a brief update on the status of SPIRE including some recent and future enhancements to the data processing and calibration.