Review

Characterization results of two infrared engineering grade detectors in the MWIR/LWIR band for the ARIEL space mission

C. Bataillon T. Pichon J. Amiaux M. Berth'e C. Cara H. Geoffray B. Horeau G. Kaszubiak N. Leguay I. Le Mer M. Lortholary J. Martignac L. Provost B. Reboul D. Renaud F. Visticot

Aug 2026 · Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation · Vol 14157, pp. 141570A - 141570A-14 · 3 citations · 20 references

Engineering

Abstract

ARIEL (Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large survey) is an ESA M4 mission, adopted in November 2020 and planned to be launched in 2031 by Ariane 6 from Kourou toward a large amplitude orbit around L2 for a 4-year mission. Its main goal is to characterize the atmosphere of exoplanets using transit spectroscopy. Around 1,000 diverse planets orbiting different type of stars will be studied. The payload module is made of two instruments. The ARIEL InfraRed Spectrometer (AIRS) is one of them. Spectroscopic measurements from the near-infrared domain (1.75μm) to the long-wave infrared domain (7.9μm) are performed. The instrument relies on the use of two H1RG detectors with cut-off wavelengths of 4.8 μm and 8.1 μm, respectively. In this paper, various performance measurements are presented such as detector baseline, readout noise, dark current, readout glow and persistence. Particular attention is paid to the stability of the acquisition chain, as this is a key element of the ARIEL space mission.

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