FIRAS Explanatory SupplementVersion 4 (dated 30 December 1997) is now on line. It contains detailed descriptions of the FIRAS instrument, its calibration and operation, and the Pass 4 FIRAS Data Sets. You may download the Explanatory Supplement or use this Web page to browse it. A PostScript version of the entire document (137 pages; Appendices excluded) is provided for convenient printing. The document is also available by ftp in unprocessed form (LaTeX manuscript with Encapsulated PostScript figures and assorted ASCII and PostScript files). For advice on which files to download, please README. To browse individual sections of the Explanatory Supplement, click on the section names below. Appendices A - F are manuscripts of journal or conference proceedings articles in PostScript form. Appendices G - J are flat ASCII files. Main body of the Explanatory Supplement
Appendix A"The
Cosmic Microwave Background Spectrum from the Full COBE FIRAS
Data Set" - Fixsen, D.J. et al. 1996, ApJ,
473, 576 (figures not available in electronic form)
Appendix B"Design for the COBE Far Infrared Absolute Spectrophotometer (FIRAS)" - Mather, J.C., Fixsen, D.J., and Shafer, R.A., 1993, COBE Preprint 93-10, in Proc. SPIE, 2019, 168 (SPIE: Bellingham, WA), from Conference on Infrared Spaceborne Remote Sensing, 11 - 16 July 1993, San Diego, CA Appendix C"Calibration
of the COBE FIRAS Instrument" - Fixsen, D.J. et
al. 1994, ApJ, 420, 457 Appendix D"Morphology
of the Interstellar Cooling Lines Detected by COBE"
- Bennett, C.L. et al. 1994, ApJ, 434, 587 Appendix E"The
COBE FIRAS Project Pipeline Software System" - Read,
S.M. et al. 1992, in First Annual Conference on Astronomical
Data Analaysis and Systems, NOAO, Tucson, AZ (figures not
available in electronic form) Appendix F"Pattern
Matching in COBE Spectral Analysis" - Isaacman,
R.B., Read, S.M., and Barnes, W.J. 1992, in First Annual Conference
on Astronomical Data Analaysis and Systems, NOAO, Tucson,
AZ (figures not available in electronic form) Appendix GConcatenated
listing of FIRAS FITS headers Appendix HFIRAS
Record Definition Language files Appendix IFIRAS
ASCII Format Reference Datasets Appendix JListings
of programs designed to read FIRAS data files Appendix K (not yet available)Intended to contain color versions of the Explanatory Supplement figures. Until this is ready, please refer to the FIRAS images page . |