A liquid-helium-cooled absolute reference cold load for long-wavelength radiometric calibration

Design, radiometric and thermal performance, and operation of a large diameter (78 cm) liquid-helium-cooled blackbody absolute reference cold load (CL) for the calibration of microwave radiometers is described. CL provides an absolute calibration near the liquid-helium (LHe) boiling point, with tota...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Review of scientific instruments 1992-10, Vol.63 (10:00 PM), p.4377-4389
Main Authors: Bensadoun, Marc, Witebsky, Chris, Smoot, George, De Amici, Giovanni, Kogut, AL, Levin, Steve
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
440104 - Radiation Instrumentation- High Energy Physics Instrumentation
661210 - Cryogenics- (1992-)
BLACKBODY RADIATION
CALIBRATION
CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSICS
COSMIC RAY DETECTION
CRYOGENICS
DETECTION
ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION
Exact sciences and technology
FREQUENCY RANGE
GHZ RANGE
GHZ RANGE 01-100
Instrumentation And Photography
INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Laboratory procedures
MEASURING INSTRUMENTS
Metrology, measurements and laboratory procedures
MICROWAVE RADIATION
Physics
RADIATION DETECTION
RADIATION DETECTORS
RADIATIONS
RADIOMETERS
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Description
Summary:Design, radiometric and thermal performance, and operation of a large diameter (78 cm) liquid-helium-cooled blackbody absolute reference cold load (CL) for the calibration of microwave radiometers is described. CL provides an absolute calibration near the liquid-helium (LHe) boiling point, with total uncertainty in the radiometric temperature of less than 30 mK over the 2.5-23 cm wavelength operating range. CL was used at several wavelengths at the South Pole, Antarctica and the White Mountain Research Center, California. Results show that, for the instruments operated at 20-, 12-, 7.9-, and 4.0 cm wavelength at the South Pole, the total corrections to the LHe boiling-point temperature (about 3.8 K) were 48 +/-23, 18 +/-10, 10 +/-18, and 15 +/-mK.
ISSN:0034-6748
1089-7623
DOI:10.1063/1.1143738