The exposure time is the amount of time that the detector is exposed to light. This is related to the integration time, which is the amount of time the detector keeps electrons trapped in the pixel wells before reading them. If the detector has a shutter, the exposure time can be shorter than the integration time. StellarNet detectors do not have shutters, so these two times are the same. There is also a third term, acquisition, that can always be used interchangeably with exposure. StellarNet uses all three terms – acquisition, exposure, integration – interchangeably. The specifications sheets for the spectrometers call the exposure time “detector integration.” An exposure time should be chosen that maximizes counts without saturating the detector. This is illustrated below:
