APEX-a new pushbroom imaging spectrometer for imaging spectroscopy applications: current design and status

Within the framework of the European Space Agency's funding scheme PRODEX, an airborne imaging spectrometer named APEX (Airborne PRISM Experiment) is developed. APEX is designed to be a pushbroom imager with 300 spectral channels in the 400-2500 nm wavelength region, and with 1000 pixels across track. The mission objectives of APEX are mainly being a simulator, calibrator and validation experiment and fostering the application development for hyperspectral imaging. The APEX hardware consists of an airborne imaging spectrometer with an optimized hyperspectral sensor design for the detection of land surface processes, a flexible aircraft integration scheme, a laboratory calibration home base, and a Processing and Archiving Facility (PAF) for the generation of Level 1 through 3 data.