ESA's upcoming Juice mission to Jupiter, scheduled to launch on April 13th, has undergone extensive testing, including assessing the effects of atomic oxygen on spacecraft materials, particularly silver interconnects used in the solar arrays, to ensure they can withstand the mission's elliptical orbit phase around Ganymede.
Preparing for Atomic Oxygen: Testing Materials for ESA's Juice Mission to Jupiter's Moon Ganymede
The European Space Agency's (ESA) upcoming Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice) mission is all set to begin its eight-year journey on April 13.
The primary aim of the Juice mission is to utilize a range of remote sensing, geophysical, and in-situ instruments to carry out comprehensive observations of the colossal gas planet and its three vast ocean-bearing satellites - Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
Its purpose is to study the Jupiter system in detail, gain insights into the intricate environment of Jupiter, explore these moons as planetary entities and potential habitats, and investigate how the gas giants of the Universe are formed.
With such a complex mission ahead, the spacecraft's team had to prepare for every possible contingency, even down to the microscopic scale, through various tests.
The testing included examining the silver interconnects used in the Juice solar arrays to understand their ability to withstand erosive atomic oxygen found surrounding Jupiter's moon Ganymede, where the spacecraft will go into orbit during the final phase of the exploration.
The Juice's interconnects are a few tenths of a thousandth of a millimeter thick, and the team needed to ensure that the atomic oxygen the spacecraft would encounter in Ganymede's elliptical orbit would not compromise the interconnectors' functionality.
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LEOX Facility: Simulating Space Environment for Juice Mission Testing
The testing took place at the Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory of the European Space Agency's ESTEC technical center in the Netherlands, specifically in the Low Earth Orbit Facility, LEOX, which uses a laser to dissociate molecular oxygen into atomic oxygen at energy levels that simulate the space environment.
According to ESA materials engineer Gabor Milassin, who performed the testing, "The general effects of atomic oxygen exposure could be seen clearly on the sample interconnectors. However, it was demonstrated that this was only a surface effect, and no major cracks were observed which could compromise the functionality of the interconnects - the silver interconnects could be given a clean bill of health to go to Ganymede."
The lab also tested various other materials related to the Juice mission to further ensure the spacecraft's success, including multi-layer insulation, adhesive tapes, and thermal control coatings.
These evaluations aimed to assess the durability of the spacecraft's materials in extreme conditions, as the mission poses particular challenges due to the significant temperature changes it will face while journeying from a high-temperature environment during a Venus flyby, where temperatures will exceed 200°C, to the much colder environment around Jupiter.
All testing procedures are critical for the optimal operation of the in-situ science instruments aboard Juice.
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