About RXTE

The All-Sky Monitor

The ASM consists of three wide-angle shadow cameras equipped with proportional counters with a total collecting area of 90 square cm. The instrumental properties are:

  • Energy range: 2 - 10 keV
  • Time resolution: 80% of the sky every 90 minutes
  • Spatial resolution: 3' x 15'
  • Number of shadow cameras: 3, each with 6 x 90 degrees FOV
  • Collecting area: 90 square cm
  • Detector: Xenon proportional counter, position-sensitive
  • Sensitivity: 20 mCrab

Events detected by the ASM will be processed on board by the EDS before insertion into the telemetry stream.

It was built by the Center for Space Research at MIT. The principal investigator is Dr. Alan M. Levine.

ASM