Hover-Cal

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

The main goal of this FONDEF-IDeA project is to develop a drone-based calibration system to characterize the optical response of mm-wave telescopes, with direct application to the Simons Observatory SAT telescopes and CLASS telescopes. The application concept consists in illuminating the telescopes from a far distance and high elevation, providing a stable reference signal with known position and orientation at all times. The main immediate application of the system will be to determine the absolute polarization angle response and its frequency dependence of mm-wave telescopes used to measure the cosmic microwave background polarized fluctuations. The same system can be used for characterizing several other optical properties, such as beam shape and sidelobes, relative amplitude and polarization response of the detectors and bandpass spectral profile. Moreover the same system can be used to characterize any other mm-wave telescope, so its market can be easily exported and expanded in the future. Finally this development will set the bases for a future mm-wave calibration satellite, which we foresee to be the ultimate solution for far field calibrations.