Large-Area Reflective Infrared Filters for Millimeter/Sub-mm Telescopes

Ground-based millimeter and sub-millimeter telescopes are attempting to image the sky with ever-larger cryogenically-cooled bolometer arrays, but face challenges in mitigating the infrared loading accompanying large apertures. Absorptive infrared filters supported by mechanical coolers scale insufficiently with aperture size. Reflective metal-mesh filters placed behind the telescope window provide a scalable solution in principle, but have been limited by photolithography constraints to diameters under 300 mm. We present laser etching as an alternate technique to photolithography for fabrication of large-area reflective filters, and show results from lab tests of 500-mm-diameter filters. Filters with up to 700-mm diameter can be fabricated using laser etching with existing capability.