ACIS Instrument Support - Monthly Progress Report for January 2012

1.  ACIS Characterization

1.3 Monitor scientific on-orbit performance of ACIS

  ...  Continued monitoring of ACIS CTI, gain, trailing pixel
  pulseheight, detector efficiency, corner pixel distribution,
  spectral line centroid and width, and focal plane temperature.
  Updated monitoring web pages.
  (http://space.mit.edu/~cgrant/monitor.html)

  ...  Continued work on a paper combining CTI, FWHM and background
  monitoring results from ACIS and Suzaku.  Continued writing text for
  A&A paper.

  ...  Requested new raw frames for periodic monitoring.


2.  Engineering

2.1 Instrument hardware engineering performance

  ...  Continue to monitor long term ACIS instrument performance.  All
  ACIS engineering parameters continue to operate within predicted limits.

2.2 Flight software maintenance

  ...  The TXINGS flight software patch that uses ACIS data to monitor
  the radiation environment correctly signaled a high radiation
  trigger on January 27 shortly before SCS107 was activated on-board.

2.3 Instrument science performance

  ...  Participated in monthly ACIS operations meeting.  Topics
  included the TXINGS patch and recent radiation shutdowns, and
  thermal issues.

  ...  Examined threshold crossing data prior to the January 23 and 27
  radiation shutdowns.  Elevated rates seen both times, but only
  January 27 fulfilled all requirements to trigger the patch.

  ...  Continued work optimizing the parameters for the TXINGS patch.
  The default parameters are conservative, intended to minimize false
  triggers, but further work indicates a more restrictive threshold
  may yield more real triggers without increasing the false triggers.

  ...  Continued daily quick-look processing of ACIS telemetry and
  maintained Web interface to ACIS real-time data.

  ...  Continued to publish the "annotated DOT" timeline reports.


3.  CXC Support

3.1 Provide user support

  ...  Updated ACIS memo listing calibration ObsIDs and observation
  characteristics (ACIS Memo #165).

3.2 Provide data analysis support

  ...  Answered SDS questions about warm focal plane temperatures and
  bias maps.  In particular, the bias map for ObsID 13479 was taken at
  -110C, but needed repair due to bias features.  Advised that the
  temperature of the donor bias map shouldn't matter too much.

  ...  Participated in CXC Cal/Ops modeling discussion group.
  Discussed CC mode calibration (nearly finished), contamination
  measurements, and gain issues at low energies on S1.

  ...  Continued to maintain ACIS calibration database of ground and
  flight data products.


4.  OCC Support

4.1 Use of MIT/ACIS EGSE at OCC

  ...  Continued support and maintenance of ACIS EGSE software and
  hardware at the OCC.



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