MKF-6 (multispectral camera)

MKF-6 camera lenses

The MKF-6 is a multispectral camera that was designed and made in East Germany for the purpose of remote sensing of the Earth's surface.[1] The device was built by the Kombinat Carl-Zeiss-Jena in cooperation with the Institute for Electronics of the Academy of Sciences of the GDR, where optical elements for the Soviet space program were developed and produced since 1969.[2]

The MKF-6 permits the combined utilization of photogrammetry and spectroscopy. It was first employed on Soyuz 22 in September 1976, on a Soyuz 7K-MF6 and on all subsequent space flights of the USSR and Russia until the end of the space station Mir in 2001. The camera is considered to be a milestone of celestial cartography and pointed the way to the HRSC camera, which was developed by Jena-Optronik GmbH, a former division of the Jenoptik Group of the Carl Zeiss AG, established in 1992 after German reunification.[3]

Because of its suitability for espionage, the MKF-6 was never sold to non-Warsaw Pact states.

  1. ^ "MKF-6M remote sensing camera". Deutsches Museum. Archived from the original on April 23, 2021. Retrieved May 30, 2020.
  2. ^ Renato Dicati (10 January 2017). Stamping the Earth from Space. Springer. pp. 346–. ISBN 978-3-319-20756-8.
  3. ^ "HRSC - High Resolution Stereo Camera". German Aerospace Center (DLR). Archived from the original on February 26, 2021. Retrieved May 30, 2020.