TY - JOUR
T1 - Vibration-free Cooler for the METIS Instrument Using Sorption Compressors
AU - Wu, Y.
AU - Mulder, T.
AU - Vermeer, C.H.
AU - Holland, H.J.
AU - Benthem, B.
AU - ter Brake, H.J.M.
N1 - Proceedings of the 25th International Cryogenic Engineering Conference and International Cryogenic Materials Conference 2014
PY - 2015
Y1 - 2015
N2 - METIS is the “Mid-infrared ELT Imager and Spectrograph” for the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) that will cover the thermal/mid-infrared wavelength range from 3-14 micron. Starting from a pumped nitrogen line at 70K, it requires cryogenic cooling of detectors and optics at 40 K (1.4 W), 25 K (1.1 W), and 8 K (0.4 W). A vibration-free cooling technology for this instrument based on sorption coolers is under development at the University of Twente in collaboration with Dutch Space. We propose a sorption-based cooler with three cascaded Joule-Thomson coolers of which the sorption compressors are all heat sunk at the 70K platform. A helium-operated cooler is used to obtain the 8K level with a cooling power of 0.4 W. Here, three pre-cooling stages are used at 40K, 25K and 15K. The latter two levels are provided by a hydrogen-based cooler, whereas the 40K level is realized by a neon-based sorption cooler. Based on our space-cooler heritage, our preliminary design used sorption compressors equipped with gas-gap heat switches. These have maximum efficiency, but the gas-gap switches add significantly to the complexity of the system. Since in METIS relatively high cooling powers are required, and thus a high number of compressor cells, manufacturability is an important issue. We, therefore, developed an alternative cylindrical compressor design that uses short-pulse heating establishing a thermal wave in radial direction. This allows to omit the gas-gap heat switch. The paper discusses the adapted cell design and two METIS cooler demonstrator setups that are currently under construction.
AB - METIS is the “Mid-infrared ELT Imager and Spectrograph” for the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) that will cover the thermal/mid-infrared wavelength range from 3-14 micron. Starting from a pumped nitrogen line at 70K, it requires cryogenic cooling of detectors and optics at 40 K (1.4 W), 25 K (1.1 W), and 8 K (0.4 W). A vibration-free cooling technology for this instrument based on sorption coolers is under development at the University of Twente in collaboration with Dutch Space. We propose a sorption-based cooler with three cascaded Joule-Thomson coolers of which the sorption compressors are all heat sunk at the 70K platform. A helium-operated cooler is used to obtain the 8K level with a cooling power of 0.4 W. Here, three pre-cooling stages are used at 40K, 25K and 15K. The latter two levels are provided by a hydrogen-based cooler, whereas the 40K level is realized by a neon-based sorption cooler. Based on our space-cooler heritage, our preliminary design used sorption compressors equipped with gas-gap heat switches. These have maximum efficiency, but the gas-gap switches add significantly to the complexity of the system. Since in METIS relatively high cooling powers are required, and thus a high number of compressor cells, manufacturability is an important issue. We, therefore, developed an alternative cylindrical compressor design that uses short-pulse heating establishing a thermal wave in radial direction. This allows to omit the gas-gap heat switch. The paper discusses the adapted cell design and two METIS cooler demonstrator setups that are currently under construction.
U2 - 10.1016/j.phpro.2015.06.050
DO - 10.1016/j.phpro.2015.06.050
M3 - Article
SN - 1875-3892
VL - 67
SP - 411
EP - 416
JO - Physics procedia
JF - Physics procedia
ER -