Improved calibration of SOIR/Venus Express spectra

Ann Carine Vandaele (1) , Arnaud Mahieux (1) , Séverine Robert (1) , Sophie Berkenbosch (1) , Roland Clairquin (1) , Rachel Drummond (1) , Vincent Letocart (1) , Eddy Neefs (1) , Bojan Ristic (1) , Valérie Wilquet (1) , Frédéric Colomer (2) , Denis Belyaev (3, 4) , Jean-Loup Bertaux (5)

1 BIRA-IASB - Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy / Institut d'Aéronomie Spatiale de Belgique
2 Ecole Polytechnique de Bruxelles
3 IKI - Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences
4 MIPT - Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology [Moscow]
5 PLANETO - LATMOS

The SOIR instrument on board the ESA Venus Express mission has been operational since the insertion of the satellite around Venus in April 2006. Since then, it has delivered high quality IR solar occultation spectra of the atmosphere of Venus. The different steps from raw spectra to archived data are described and explained in detail here. These consist of corrections for the dark current and for the non-linearity of the detector; removing bad pixels, as well as deriving noise. The spectral calibration procedure is described, along with all ancillary data necessary for the understanding and interpretation of the SOIR data. These include the full characterization of the AOTF filter, one of the major elements of the instrument. All these data can be found in the ESA PSA archive.

Domaines: Planétologie et astrophysique de la terre [astro-ph.EP]; Planétologie et astrophysique de la terre [astro-ph.EP]

Ann Carine Vandaele, Arnaud Mahieux, Séverine Robert, Sophie Berkenbosch, Roland Clairquin, et al.. Improved calibration of SOIR/Venus Express spectra. Optics Express, 2013, 21 (18), pp.21148-21161. ⟨10.1364/OE.21.021148⟩. ⟨hal-00867226⟩