Space Infrared Telescope Facility
The Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF) is an infrared space observatory, the final one in the Great Observatories Program of NASA.It was launched on Monday August 25, 2003 at 1:35:39 (EDT) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on a Delta 7920H ELV rocket. It will follow a rather unusual orbit, heliocentric instead of geocentric, following earth in its orbit. It is expected to last at least 2.5 years, with 5 or more the goal.
The primary mirror is 85 cm in diameter, f/12 and made of Beryllium and cooled to 5.5 K.
It contains several instruments, that will allow it to do imaging and photometry from 3 to 180 microns, spectroscopy from 5-40 microns and spectrophotometry from 5-100 microns.
