New x-ray telescope mission (NeXT)

Next Japanese X-ray mission after AstroE2 will be dedicated to the exploration of non-thermal phenomena in the Universe by the hard X-ray imaging, high resolution spectroscopy and broad band coverage. The objectives are the non-thermal X-ray components in cluster of galaxies and SNR, hidden AGN and their contribution to the cosmic X-ray background. Such non-thermal energy is considerable amount of the total energy in the Universe. Multilayer supermirror hard X-ray telescopes (50 cm diameter and 12 m focal length) will focus hard X-rays up to 60 keV or higher. Hybrid X-ray imaging system consisted of CCD cameras for soft X-ray imaging and a hard X-ray imaging detector will be placed at the focal points of four multilayer telescopes. A micro-calorimeter array detector is prepared for a soft X-ray telescope to perform imaging spectrometry (60 cm diameter and 8 m focal length). A soft gamma-ray detector will cover up to several hundred keV. It will provide extremely low background by imaging capability. This X-ray mission is now named "NeXT", which stands for "New X-ray Telescope mission" or "Non-thermal Energy eXpring Telescope mission." It will be launched in 2010 by an M-V rocket.