Usage Conditions May Apply Usage Conditions Apply There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page. IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and image viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. More - https://iiif.si.edu View Manifest View in Mirador Viewer Usage Conditions May Apply Usage Conditions Apply There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page. IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and image viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. More - https://iiif.si.edu View Manifest View in Mirador Viewer Usage Conditions May Apply Usage Conditions Apply There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page. IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and image viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. More - https://iiif.si.edu View Manifest View in Mirador Viewer Usage Conditions May Apply Usage Conditions Apply There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page. IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and image viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. More - https://iiif.si.edu View Manifest View in Mirador Viewer

This is a pressurized container for the Woody-Richards experiment, a balloon-borne Fourier transform far infrared spectrometer. It was one of the first projects designed to measure the microwave background discovered by Penzias and Wilson. To achieve maximum sensitivity the assembly was immersed in a cryostat cooled with superfluid helium at less than one degree absolute. The spectrometer was flown three times in the mid-1970s. The results from these experiments, announced in 1979, provided widely accepted data on the thermal characteristics of the cosmic background radiation, improved only by the announcement of data from instruments flown on the Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) satellite. This experiment combined novel technologies that were later used on FIRAS/COBE.

It was donated to NASM in 1997 by Professor Paul Richards of the Department of Physics at the University of California, Berkeley.

 Display Status

This object is not on display at the National Air and Space Museum. It is either on loan or in storage.
Object Details
Country of Origin United States of America Type INSTRUMENTS-Scientific Dimensions Storage (Rehoused on aluminum pallet with additional objects): 215.3 × 153.7 × 101.6cm, 165.1kg (84 3/4 × 60 1/2 × 40 in., 364lb.)
 Materials Aluminum, Paint, Steel, Rubber (Silicone), Phenolic Resin, Brass, Mineral (glass) fabric, Epoxy
 Inventory Number A19970343002 Credit Line Donated by the University of California, Berkeley Data Source National Air and Space Museum Restrictions & Rights Usage conditions apply
For more information, visit the Smithsonians Terms of Use.