Design Trade-Offs For A Multispectral Linear Array (MLA) Instrument

The heart of the MLA design problem is to develop an instrument concept which concurrently provides a wide field-of-view with high resolution, spectral separation with precise band-to hand registration, and excellent radiometric accuracy. Often, these requirements have conflicting design implications which can only be resolved by careful tradeoffs that consider performance, cost, fabrication feasibility and development risk. The key design tradeoffs for an MLA instrument are addressed in this paper, and elements of a baseline instrument concept are presented.