Wide dynamic range camera system

astronomydetectionNIR

Andor Technology (Andor), an Oxford Instruments company and world leader in scientific imaging and spectroscopy solutions, today announced the launch of the new ultra-sensitive Balor, a very large area sCMOS camera for ground-based astronomy applications. Combining a 16.9 Megapixel, 70mm sensor with fast ultra-low noise readout, Balor is the perfect detector solution for large sky surveys that measure photometric and astrometric variability across timescales ranging from milliseconds to tens of seconds. As the largest commercially available sCMOS camera, Balor is designed for ‘dynamic astronomy’ applications such as Orbital Debris tracking, Solar Astronomy, Solar System Object detection, Exoplanet Discovery, Atmospheric Studies and Fast Time Resolution Astrophysics. Balor combines 2.9 e- read noise with an exceptionally fast 18.5 millisecond readout, allowing up to 54fps full frame readout which is perfect for studying solar or atmospheric dynamics. Quantum Efficiency is optimized for broad response across the visible-red-NIR range, with no etaloning effects, outperforming in the area of quantitative photometric measurement. The large 12 µm pixels offer an 80,000 electron well depth and an on-chip multi-amplifier design means the whole photometric range, from noise floor to saturation limit, can be captured with a single image. The wide dynamic range is complemented by enhanced on-head intelligence to deliver market-leading linearity of > 99.7%, for unparalleled quantitative accuracy of measurement across the full signal range. Such capability is ideal for photometric accuracy of light curve measurement across high dynamic range object fields.