CAMERA OF THE INFRARED SPACE-OBSERVATORY

The Infrared Space Observatory (ISO) camera (ISOCAM) is designed to ma p selected regions of the sky in the spectral region from 2.5 to 17 mu m at various spatial and spectral resolutions and at high sensitivity ( at >4 mum, <1 mJy/10 s in 200 s). It will make images, within the 3- arcmin field of view of the ISO telescope, with two 32 x 32 IR array d etectors: an InSb charge injection device (CID) for the 2.5- to 5.5-mu m range and a Si:Ga direct voltage readout for the 4- to 17-mum range. Four different pixel fields of view are available on each channel: 1. 5, 3, 6, and 12 arcsec. The spectral range can be selected in each cha nnel by a set of about 10 fixed bandpass filters (resolution from 2 to 100) and continuous variable filters (resolution -45); polarization m easurements are possible as well. A very wide range of astrophysical p roblems can be tackled with ISOCAM. We present a brief description of the program planned by the ISOCAM team.