Flight camera package design, calibration, and performance for the Water Recovery X-ray Rocket mission

The Water Recovery X-ray Rocket (WRXR) mission was a sounding rocket flight that targeted the northern part of the Vela supernova remnant with a camera designed to image the diffracted X-rays using a grating spectrometer optimized for OVII, OVIII, and CVI emissions. The readout camera for WRXR utilized a silicon hybrid CMOS detector (HCD) with an active area of 36.9  36.9 mm. A modified H2RG X-ray HCD, with 1024  1024 active silicon pixels bonded to the H2RG read-out integrated circuit, was selected for this mission based on its characteristics, technology maturation, and ease of implementation into the existing payload. This required a new camera package for the HCD to be designed, built, calibrated, and operated. This detector and camera system were successfully operated in-flight and its characteristics were demonstrated using the on-board calibration X-ray source. In this paper, a detailed description of this process, from design concept to flight performance, will be given. A full integrated instrument calibration will also be discussed, as well as the temperature dependency measurements of gain variation, read noise, and energy resolution for the HCD.