Johannes STAGUHN
(JHU & NASA/GSFC)
The Origins Space Telescope is the mission concept for the Far-Infrared Surveyor, one of the four science and technology definition studies to be submitted by NASA Headquarters to the 2020 Astronomy and Astrophysics Decadal survey. The observatory will provide orders of magnitude improvements in sensitivity over prior missions, in particular for spectroscopy, enabling breakthrough science across astrophysics. The observatory will cover a wavelength range between 5 μm and 600 μm in order to enable the study of the formation of proto-planetary disks, detection of bio-signatures from extra-solar planet's atmospheres, characterization of the first galaxies in the universe, and many more. <br>Key technologies enabling the mission include large cryogenic optics (the ~10 m telescope will be cooled to 4 K) and the associated cryo-coolers, plus sub-Kelvin coolers for the science instruments using superconducting detectors for the incoherent far-infrared imager/polarimeter and spectrometers. The five instruments that are currently studied are two imaging far-infrared spectrometers using incoherent detectors, providing up to R~ 10^5 spectral resolution, one far-infrared heterodyne instrument for even higher spectral resolving powers, one far-infrared continuum imager and polarimeter, plus a mid-infrared coronograph with imaging and spectroscopy mode. <br>I will describe the scientific capabilities of the observatory with emphasis on large survey capabilities.