Performance of the Faint Object Spectrograph (FOS) detectors in a variable external magnetic field

We present the results of an investigation of the in-orbit performance of the Digicon detectors in the Faint Object Spectrograph (FOS), conducted as part of the commissioning phase of the Hubble Space Telescope. This paper includes orbital results on detector background noise, sensor image stability, and photometric stability along with several typical FOS observations. This information should be of general interest to designers of future spacecraft detectors and to astronomers observing with the FOS instrument.