The SPHEREx Instrument: Calibration, Testing And Performance Measurements Of The NIR 2 Spectroscopic Surveyor From The Laboratory To In-orbit Commissioning
The SPHEREx near-infrared space telescope is an all-sky spectroscopic survey mission launched on March 12th, 2025 UTC.
In addition to providing the community with a spectral database applicable to a wide range of investigations, it is optimized to address three core science goals: to survey the large scale structure of the Universe for signatures of non-Gaussianity during inflation; to conduct intensity mapping studies of the extragalactic background light for probing the history of galaxy evolution; and to survey the plane of the Milky Way for the prevalence and distribution of water and other biogenic ices.
Each of these science goals imposes unique requirements on the performance of the instrument. We detail the design and testing strategies and report the performance results for the full instrument test campaign, ranging from component-level screening to in-orbit tests during the commissioning phase.
The instrument, currently operating in full science survey mode, meets all of its driving requirements including optical performance, point source sensitivity, thermal stability and correlated noise minimization.
Left: Rendering of the SPHEREx Instrument with key components and design elements called out. Center Top: A zoomed-in view of the MWIR FPA with its thermal heat sinks and active thermal stabilization components highlighted. Center Middle: Central cross section view of the cold instrument with optical elements labeled. Center Bottom: A zoomed in view of the dust cover eject mechanism with harnessing and spring separation device. Right: Cross section view of the DBS “doghouse” and FPAs including the internal optical baffling. — astro-ph.IM
Phil M. Korngut, James J. Bock, Samuel Condon, C. Darren Dowell, Candice M. Fazar, Howard Hui, Bradley D. Moore, Bret J. Naylor, Chi H. Nguyen, Stephen Padin, James Wincentsen, Asad M. Aboobaker, Rachel Akeson, John M. Alred, Farah Alibay, Matthew L. N. Ashby, Yoonsoo P. Bach, Joseph Bichel, Douglas Bolton, David F. Braun, Thomas Brown, Sean A. Bryan, Jill Burnham, Thomas A. Burk, Nicholas Burke, Ben Catching, Tzu-Ching Chang, Shuang-Shuang Chen, Yun-Ting Cheng, Yi-Kuan Chiang, Yong Chong, Asantha Cooray, Walter R. Cook, Velibor Cormarkovic, Brendan P. Crill, Ari J. Cukierman, Andrew Davis, Dan Darga, Thomas Disarro, Olivier Dore, Beth E. Fabinsky, Andreas L. Faisst, James L. Fanson, Allen H. Farrington, Tamim Fatahi, Richard M. Feder, Eric H. Frater, Tatiana Goldina, Varoujan Gorjian, William G. Hart, Warren Hendricks, Joseph L. Hora, Viktor Hristov, Zhaoyu Huai, Charles A. Hulse, Young-Soo Jo, Woong-Seob Jeong, Makenzie L. Kamei, Jae Hwan Kang, Branislav Kecman, Will Marchant, Giacomo Mariani, Daniel C. Masters, Gary J. Melnick, Hiromasa Miyasaka, Giulia Murgia, Christina Nelson, Hien T. Nguyen, Christopher Owen, Roberta Paladini, Sung-Joon Park, Harshad Patil, Konstantin Penanen, Chris Piazzo, Jeonghyun Pyo, Amelia Quon, Keshav Ramanathan, Zafar Rustamkulov, Daniel J. Reiley, Eric B. Rice, Flora Ridenhour, Amber Roberts, Jennifer M. Rocca, Alessandro Signorini, Sara Susca, Volker Tolls, Phani Velicheti, Pao-Yu Wang, Michael W. Werner, Casey White, Ross Williamson, Yujin Yang, Michael Zemcov
Subjects: Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics (astro-ph.IM); Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics (astro-ph.CO); Astrophysics of Galaxies (astro-ph.GA)
Cite as: arXiv:2603.29835 [astro-ph.IM](or arXiv:2603.29835v1 [astro-ph.IM] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2603.29835
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Submission history
From: Phil Korngut
[v1] Tue, 31 Mar 2026 14:57:28 UTC (30,291 KB)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.29835
Astrobiology,
