The NISS onboard NEXTSat-1 is being developed by Korea astronomy and space science institute (KASI). For the study of the cosmic star formation history, the NISS performs the imaging spectroscopic observation in the near-infrared range for nearby galaxies, low background regions, star-forming regions and so on. It is designed to cover a wide field of view (2 × 2 deg) and a wide wavelength range from 0.95 to 3.8 μm by using linear variable filters. In order to reduce the thermal noise, the telescope and the infrared sensor are cooled down to 200 K and 80 K, respectively. Evading a stray light outside the field of view and making the most use of limited space, the NISS adopts the off-axis reflective optical system. The primary and the secondary mirrors, the opto-mechanical part and the mechanical structure are designed to be made of aluminum material. It reduces the degradation of optical performance due to a thermal variation. This paper presents the study on the conceptual design of the NISS.

Infrared optical systems are operated at low temperature and vacuum (LT-V) condition, whereas the assembly and alignment are performed at room temperature and non-vacuum (RT-NV) condition. The differences in temperature and pressure between assembly/alignment environments and operation environment change the physical characteristics of optical and opto-mechanical parts (e.g., thickness, height, length, curvature, and refractive index), and the resultant optical performance changes accordingly. In this study, using input relay optics (IO), among the components of the Immersion GRating INfrared Spectrograph (IGRINS) which is an infrared spectrograph, a simulation based on the physical information of this optical system and an actual experiment were performed; and optical performances in the RT-NV, RT-V, and LT-V environments were predicted with an accuracy of 0.014±0.007 λ rms WFE, by developing an adaptive fitting line. The developed adaptive fitting line can quantitatively control assembly and alignment processes below λ/70 rms WFE. Therefore, it is expected that the subsequent processes of assembly, alignment, and performance analysis could not be repeated.