Progress towards a microchannel plate detector with AlGaN photocathode and cross-strip anode for ultraviolet astronomy

Microchannel plates (MCPs) were the driving detector technology for ultraviolet (UV) astronomy for many years, and still today, MCP-based detectors are the baseline for several planned UV instruments. The development of advanced MCP detectors is ongoing and pursues the major goals of maximizing sensitivity, resolution, and lifetime while at the same time decreasing weight, volume, and power consumption. Development efforts for an MCP-based detector system for the UV are running at IAAT at the University of Tübingen. In this publication, we present our latest results towards coating aluminum gallium nitride (AlGaN) photocathodes directly on MCPs, to improve quantum detection efficiency in the far- and extreme-UV. Furthermore, we report on the implementation of a noniterative centroiding algorithm for our coplanar cross-strip anode directly in an FPGA.