ACIS Instrument Support - Monthly Progress Report for January 2020

1.  ACIS Characterization

1.1 Characterize and model radiation damage in ACIS CCDs.

  ...  Worked on new CTI correction coefficients for FI temperature dependent CTI correction.  New coefficients were incorporated into CALDB files which were tested with ECS data.  Results were not acceptable for release and further work needs to be done.

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).


2.  Engineering

2.1 Instrument hardware engineering performance

  ...  Continue to monitor long term ACIS instrument performance.  Reviewed trends in engineering data for the past 60 days; no unexpected trends were seen.

  ...  The EEPROM checksum was verified in the JAN0620A load.   Will continue to run monthly.  MIT telemetry processing will automatically check the results and send out an alert if the checksum is unexpected.

  ...  Reviewed SAR to perform a focal plane cooling test in February.

2.2 Flight software maintenance

  ...  ACIS flight software patch G-H-I (improved buscrash and new deahktrip) uploaded on January 24, 2020.  First new patch set since June 2014.

  ...  In preparation for the patch upload, a CAP was run to dump the on-board ACIS FSW from EEPROM on January 15.  The CAP was executed successfully.  This was a test of the full telemetry verification system at Wayside, including the EGSE, documentation, and people.  Reviewed procedures, supported CAP review, prepared EGSE for real-time activity.

  ...  Supported successful FSW patch upload on Jan 24.  Reviewed procedures, supported CAP review, prepared EGSE for real-time activity, verified patch command upload and patch dump file in real-time.

  ...  After succesful FSW patch upload, updated ACIS anomaly quick-response pages, released text edits to the SOT SOP, updated alert systems to check from the updated FSW version number, updated the TXINGS parameters from the default to the current optimal parameters via a SAR and the command load, updated Engineering Unit test scripts to default to the new FSW version.

  ...  We continue to monitor threshold crossing rates.  The current TXINGS parameters were last updated on July 28, 2016.  Threshold crossing rates may have flattened out and started decreasing recently, potentially indicating the end of solar minimum.

  ...  Continued work on a major update to the ACIS FSW User's Guide review, including corrections and updates to match current usage.

2.3 Instrument science performance

  ...  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

  ...  ACIS memo listing calibration ObsIDs and observation characteristics (ACIS Memo #165) will no longer be updated.  Functionality is replaced by new web page (http://acis.mit.edu/asc/evt-page.html), which provides the same information but is more automated.

3.2 Provide data analysis support

  ...  Participated in CXC Cal/Ops ACIS response discussion group.  Discussed new temperature-dependent CTI coefficients.  Discussed status of the gain droop correction and testing of the next contamination CALDB update.

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

  ...  Participated in final editing of IACHEC newsletter describing activities in 2019.


4.  OCC Support

4.1 Use of MIT/ACIS EGSE at OCC

  ...  Continued support and maintenance of ACIS EGSE software and hardware at the Wayside OCC.  Performed check of all ACIS hardware and software at the OCC before each of the real-time procedures in January.

  ...  Major update to ACIS ops Wayside / EGSE documentation to match the updated acisCtl 2.0 now running on emily and malang.  

4.2 Generation of commands for ACIS observations

  ...  Continue working to assign SI modes for remaining observations in cycle 21.  Interacting with USINT to finalize configurations and correct chip drop order errors.

  ...  Provided list of SI modes utilizing windows and general rules for how window blocks are assigned for testing of a load review tool which checks for poorly configured windows.

  ...  Reviewed JAN1320A command load.  Reviewed JAN2720 LTS OR list, JAN1320 preliminary schedule, and JAN1320 final OR list.

  ...  Dropped chips from 3 ObsIDs

  ...  Checking on automated processes associated with SACGS.