Model philosophy of focal plane assemblies for PLATO mission

PLATO, the PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars mission, is an ESA mission dedicated to finding and studying extrasolar planetary systems, with a special emphasis on rocky planets around Sun-like stars and their habitable zone, planned to be launched in 2026. Payload is composed of 26 cameras in the same instrument bench in order to cover a large field of view with the highest possible photon statistics. Each PLATO Camera consists of a Telescope (TOU, Telescope Optical Unit), a Focal Plane Assembly (FPA), and a Front-End Electronics box (FEE). This paper is focused on the FPAs which contain four CCD (Charge-Coupled Device) sensors. It presents the model philosophy to reach the flight model for this particular serial production project. The flight FPA design and the different models which have been manufactured will be described. In total, 37 FPAs (holding 144 CCDs) have been manufactured plus 26 mass thermal dummies. We want to remark one of the biggest challenges of this project which is the precise alignment requirements for the CCD sensors within the different cameras.