Curving monolithic infrared detectors: application to large field of view telescope and spectrometry

Spatial applications have several challenges. In ground based astronomy, wide survey telescopes are built with larger field of view in order to observe larger part of the sky. The requirement is to increase the field of view as well as the sensibility in order to detect even smaller objects or light (meteorites, debris from human activities, and light from exoplanets or supernovae). Telescopes with large field of view and high resolution need large aperture diameter and so a very fast camera is needed. However, in these cameras the main difficulty is to correct aberrations of curvature. In spatial astronomy for instance star trackers, spatial telescopes and spectrometers, a larger field of view and a better resolution are also needed. However, the main requirement is given by the necessity to launch these instruments and this step is particularly expensive. So the specific requirement is to decrease the volume and weight of these systems in order to decrease the launched price and to increase the number of systems launched. The key point is thus the miniaturization of these systems. However by scaling down the system, the detector becomes closer to the optical element and so less space could be dedicated to correct aberrations.