Integration of an intensified charge-coupled device (ICCD) camera for accurate spectroscopic measurements

Intensified charge-coupled devices (ICCD) are used in a great variety of spectroscopic applications, some of them requiring high sensitivity and spectral resolution. The setup, configuration, and featuring of these cameras are fundamental issues in order to acquire high quality spectra. In this work a critical assessment of these detectors is performed and the specific configuration, the optical alignment, featuring, and the dark and shot noise are described and analyzed. Spatial response of the detector usually shows a significant lack of spatial homogeneity and a map of interferences may appear in certain ranges of wavelengths, which damages the quality of the recorded spectra. In this work the spectral resolution and the spatial and spectral sensitivity are also studied. The analysis of the dark current reveals the existence of a smooth but clear spatial dependence. As a final conclusion, the spectra registered with the spectrometer equipped with our ICCD camera allow us to explore and measure accurately spectral line shapes emitted by pulsed plasmas in the visible range and particularly in the ultraviolet (UV) range.