In many space sciences project cryogenic detectors are essential for the accomplishment of the scientific objectives, offering unique advantages and unmatched performance. In addition several other components such as the optics can benefit from a cryogenic cooling which reduces the radiative loading. The Service des Basses Températ- ures (SBT) of CEA Grenoble has been involved in space cryogenics for over 20 years now and features a dedicated laboratory, the Cryocoolers and Space Cryogenics group. Various cryocoolers have been developed in the past and our fields of activity focus now on four main technologies: sorption coolers, multistage pulse tubes, adiabatic demagnetization refrigerators (ADR), and cryogenic loop heat pipes. In addition work on two new concepts for ground based dilution refrigerators is also ongoing. Finally developments on various key technologies such as the heat switches, the suspension or structural systems are also carried out. These developments are mainly funded by the European Space Agency (ESA) or by the Centre National d'Études Spatiales (CNES).In this paper we mostly give an overview of the developments carried out at SBT along with several examples of other relevant systems. We use space cryogenics as a thread. However these coolers or techniques can be used on ground, particularly on remote locations where liquid cryogen are unavailable and/or where maintenance must be limited to a strict minimum. In this case they can be simplified and take advantage of on ground resources, and their cost can be significantly reduced. For most of these systems the common feature is the absence of any moving parts or any friction, which guarantees a very good reliability and make them very good candidates for space borne instruments requiring cryogenic temperatures.

This paper gives an overview of the potential of and developments on Transition Edge Sensors for astronomical research from Space. This type of sensor is under development for imaging X-ray spectrometers as well as for very sensitive InfraRed and sub-mm imaging detectors. This paper describes developments in Europe for the International X-ray Observatory IXO (ESA, JAXA, NASA) and for the SAFARI instrument on the Japanese IR-mission SPICA. 
The micro-calorimeter array for the IXO-mission will have an imaging array of at least 1024 pixels with high quantum efficiency in the 0.1–10 keV energy range and an energy resolution as small as 2 eV for each detected photon. The SAFARI instrument requires three imaging arrays with an optical Noise Equivalent Power (NEP) as low as ≤ 5 × 10-19 W/√Hz with a total amount of 5940 pixels to read a Fourier Transform Spectrometer. The paper is written to be read together with the presentation given at the Astrophysics Detector Workshop 2008, Nice 17–20 November 2008, France.

Using as an illustration cryogenic detectors, I discuss a few innovativeideas that resulted in significant progress in sensitivity. After presenting the mainclasses of sensors, I summarize the impact of cryogenic detectors on Dark Matter,one of the outstanding questions in astroparticle physics and cosmology.I briefly review some applications in astrophysics and other fields.

Thanks to development of some new detectors small compare to wavelength of detected wave, as we foreseen in SWIFTS that these detectors can be placed in the vanishing field along propagation of light in order to detect the Lippmann interferogram, we propose here to present basic of SWIFTS and review some concepts where detectors has already set inside optical components and thinking about extensions of the concept of SWIFTS in new optical instrumentation by including directly detectors inside optical component.

This contribution is intended to provide a brief overview of mm-wave heterodyne instrumentation, of the main categories of components, and of the challenges for continued development. The scope of this overview includes, beyond the receiver itself, the antenna and the atmosphere, that jointly contribute to the achievable sensitivity. It does not include spectrometers, whose technology is not specific to the mm-wave domain, and with which a simple interface (power level, bandwidth) can be defined. This review reports the progress of the community of engineers and scientists devoting themselves to the improvement of mm-wave heterodyne instrumentation; in the course of its preparation, I have benefitted from the experience accumulated during years of collaboration with that community at large, and with my colleagues at IRAM in particular.

Receivers for the millimeter and sub-millimeter range employ SIS mixers for the coherent detection of astronomical signals. A very brief overview of the theory of SIS mixers is given, followed bya presentation of recent mixer development at IRAM.

Superconducting heterodyne mixers have found widespread usethroughout the Millimeter- and Sub-millimeter wavelength range inradio astronomy applications that need very high spectralresolution. To extend their operating range into the Terahertzregion, which is opened up by new high altitude observatories,airborne platforms or satellites, requires further development ofsuperconductor materials as well as progress in radio frequency (RF)design and detector fabrication. This paper summarizes the basicchallenges in these areas.

This article presents current R&D activities at Observatoire de Paris – Laboratoire d'Etude du Rayonnement et de la Matière en Astrophysique in the fields of low noise mixers and local oscillators for heterodyne instruments dedicated to astrophysics, planetology and the sciences of the atmosphere.

In the framework of the DCMB (Développement Concerté de Matrices de Bolomètres) collaboration we develop low temperature bolometer arrays for large field, high resolution imaging in astrophysics. DCMB is a R&D effort funded by CNES and CNRS involving a number of French laboratories. Two parallel developments have been made in this collaboration based on the NbSi alloy either semi-conducting or superconducting depending on the Nb concentration. Multiplexing schemes have been developed and demonstrated for these two options. Here we focus on high impedance bolometers and present two examples of array developments in progress: first, a 23 pixels array for the balloon-borne instrument OLIMPO and, second, 204 pixels for ground based observations with the 30 m IRAM telescope.

X-ray microcalorimeter arrays are well suited to address key problems in high-energy astrophysics; this microcalorimeter uses thermometers based on technology IDT (Implanted Diffused Thermometer) implemented in silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafers. This work presents our results on the test (measurements) of the thermometer prototype.

Throughout the last decades, development of low-temperat- ure detectors focused mainly on the design of high-sensitivity, single-pixel devices. This includes such devices as semiconductor-based photodetectors and bolometers, Magnetic Metallic Calorimeters (MMC), Superconducting Tunnel Junctions (STJ), and Transition Edge Sensors (TES). However, these devices have had limited success in achieving the simultaneous large-scale array sizes and large-bandwidth operation necessary for high-speed, high-resolution detection. To overcome this performance limitation, it is advisable to focus on low-temperature detectors which are intrinsically adapted to giant-array multiplexing and ultra-fast readout. To adopt large scale frequency-domain multiplexing for low-temperature detectors, it is necessary to find detectors which“broadcast” at microwave frequencies. Superconducting microwave resonators naturally lend themselves to this task. One recent demonstration is an implementation known as Kinetic Inductance Detectors (KIDs). This detection mechanism can be adopted for low-energy EM radiation (radio, mm, THz) in continuous mode, or in pulsed mode for higher energy radiation and particles. We present an ongoing development for a KIDs instrument dedicated to millimetric ground-based observations at the 30m IRAM telescope at Pico Veleta. The Neel IRAM KIDs Array (NIKA) project is coordinated in Grenoble and involves groups in Holland (SRON), UK (Cardiff) and Italy (Roma).

We report on the performance of the digital baseband feedback circuit developed to readout and process signals from arrays of transition edge sensors for SPICA-SAFARI in frequency domain multiplexing (FDM). The standard procedure to readout the SQUID current amplifiers is to use a feedback loop (flux-locked loop: FLL). However the achievable FFL bandwidth is limited by the cable transport delay td, which makes standard feedback inconvenient. A much better approach is to use baseband feedback. We have developed a model of the electronic readout chain for SPICA-SAFARI instrument by using an Anlog-digital co-simulation based on Simulink-System Generator environment.

This paper concentrates on a first demonstrator, a 23 NbSi superconducting thermometer array, developed in the DCMB collaboration. Firstly, the NbSi thin film alloy is described then the 23 TES array topology is presented. After that, DC and noise cryogenic measurement is reported. The cryogenic readout chain is also presented and finally, the multiplexing scheme developed for the readout of the 23 pixels array is described.

The European Space Agency is building a space telescope to observe the Universe in the Far-IR and sub-millimeter regime of the electromagnetic spectrum. The scientific payload is composed of three instruments. One of them, PACS, is equipped with a novel type of bolometer arrays developed by CEA in the late 90's. We briefly present the PACS Photometer and the architecture of CEA filled bolometer arrays. We accessed the physics of the detectors and thoroughly measured their performances by developing a pragmatic calibration procedure. The Photometer is now calibrated and integrated on the focal plane of the observatory. The launch is scheduled for April 2009. Meanwhile, CEA is working on adapting PACS bolometers to longer wavelength for wide-field ground-based telescopes, and for the future cold-telescope space mission SPICA.

Nançay radio astronomy station teams are involved in several aspects of the Research and Development (R&D) for radio astronomy detectors and systems: i) Microelectronics: Low Noise Amplifiers (LNA), receiver on chip and system in package. The long-term goal is to provide sub-systems for the future Square Kilometer Array and its Pathfinders. A beamformer chip has been integrated in the FP6 SKADS dense aperture array technology demonstrator EMBRACE. Wide band SiGe LNAs are developed, beamformers with in-chip control are studied and more complex integrated receivers are designed for the european Aperture Array Verification Programme demonstrator. ii) Digital signal processing: EMBRACE beamforming has been implementedin the digital backend and RFI-mitigation oriented signal processing has been designed for realtime systems,including work for FP6 SKADS and FP7 PrepSKA. iii) A study of Phased Array Feeds has started in 2008, in order to study the radio electric properties of PAFs at the focus of large F/D telescopes, such as the Nançay Radio Telescope, as well as to test PAFsystems in collaboration with the SPP/IRFU and LAL/IN2P3 laboratories.

ArTeMiS is a bolometer camera that will be installed at the APEX submillimeter telescope in Chile in 2010. This instrument will be a powerful tool for scientists with its three focal planes that will operate simultaneously in background limited conditions at 200, 350 and 450 microns (5760 pixels in total). A prototype called p-ArTeMiS has been tested at APEX in 2007 and thanks to its good performances, the team has been able to conduct scientific projects in star formation and on debris disks. This paper summarises the details of the ArTeMiS project, with a description of the detectors, the optics, the cryogenics and the electronics. We will also present the undergoing studies at CEA on detectors for the future submillimeter space missions.

This paper presents an ultra low noise instrumentation based on cryogenic electronic integrated circuit. We have designed an ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) in standard BiCMOS SiGe 0.35 μm AMS technology. The main functions of this circuit, the readout and the control of a 24 to 1 SQUID multiplexer, is presented. We also report the cryogenic operation of each part of this ASIC.

Instruments for nuclear astrophysics collect photons using geometric optics, quantum optics or wave optics. Despite their disparate aperture systems, hard X- and soft gamma-ray telescopes have in common the way photons are detected, i.e. the non-dispersive spectroscopy performed in their detectors – gaz-filled counters, scintillators, and semiconductor detectors. The objective of the present short review is to focus on the status of these detectors in space-based gamma-ray instruments.