Planetary Fourier spectrometer: An interferometer for atmospheric studies on board Mars 94 mission

Summary PFS is a two-channel Fourier spectrometer operating in the infra-red wavelengths between 1.25 and 45 μm. The instrument will be used mainly in the study of the Martian atmosphere. The principal goals are the measurements of the atmospheric temperature and pressure, atmospheric constituents, aerosol and clouds, ground pressure for surface topography, optical and thermophysics properties of the Martian soil. PFS will fly on the Mars 94 spacecraft which should be launched in 1994 and reach the planet in 1995. It is essentially constituted by two different interferometers located in the same box which is divided into two parts. A dichroic placed on the PFS entrance is used to separate the spectral range into two parts, a division needed by the different optical materials which have to be used in each spectral range. The optical layout of the experiment is very compact. Each channel uses two cubic mirrors mounted on an L-structure pivoted on a motor. The motor moves the mechanics and permits the optical-path difference between the arms to be varied. Each interformeter operates in a different spectral range, respectively, between (1.25÷4.8) μm (8000÷2083cm⁻¹) and (6÷45)μm (1666÷220)cm⁻¹). The spectral resolution is 2 cm⁻¹. The entrance aperture area is 30 cm² per channel and the field of view is 2 and 4 degrees. Every measurement lasts about 4 s. The time and, therefore, the relative optical-path difference for the measurement of every point of the interferogram is given by the zero crossings of the interferogram of a reference monochromatic channel at 1.2 μm which uses a laser diode as source. The two interferograms are double-sided and will have 16384 and 4096 points, respectively, corresponding to spectra of 6250 and 1823 useful points. Paper presented at the 6th Cosmic Physics National Conference, Palermo, 3–7 November 1992.