The smallest radar to fly in space has been delivered to ESA for integration aboard the miniature Juventas CubeSat, part of ESA\u2019s Hera mission for planetary defence. The radar will perform the first radar imaging of an asteroid, peering deep beneath the surface of Dimorphos \u2013 the Great Pyramid-sized body whose orbit was shifted last year by the impact of NASA\u2019s DART spacecraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis delivery marks a definite milestone,\u201d comments Alain H\u00e9rique of Institut de Plan\u00e9tologie et d’Astrophysique de Grenoble (IPAG) at the University Grenoble Alpes in France, the instrument\u2019s principal investigator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe have been working hard in recent weeks to finalise the radar for its handover. But this is far from the end of our involvement. IPAG and our project partners will be following the process of integration, especially in terms of connection with the rest of the CubeSat, to optimise the performance of the finished instrument, and to calibrate its performance to ensure we interpret our science data as best we can once we are in space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cLooking ahead, we will also be working on our operating procedures, to try out how we will be operating the instrument in practice, including hardware-in-the-loop testing where we will be commanding the radar via Hera and its CubeSat down on the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Scheduled to fly to the Didymos binary asteroid system with ESA\u2019s Hera mission for planetary defence in 2024, the compact radar aboard the Juventas CubeSat will perform the first ever radar sounding inside an asteroid. Juventas will peer up to 100 m deep within the 160-m-diameter Dimorphos moonlet of the 780-m-diameter Didymos asteroid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
CubeSats are mini-satellites built up from standardised 10-cm boxes. Juventas is a \u20186-unit\u2019 CubeSat, measuring 10x20x30 cm, while the Juventas radar instrument \u2013 JuRa \u2013 for short measures 9.5×9.5×9.5 cm across, able to fit within a single CubeSat unit, along with a quartet of 1.5 m-long radar antennas \u2013 which will deploy like metal tape measures and have been manufactured by Astronika in Poland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
JuRa\u2019s radar electronics are the responsibility of EmTroniX in Luxembourg, a company that initially developed automotive electronics before expanding into designing and producing payloads and avionics for \u2018New Space\u2019 missions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt feels good to deliver something to our customer, but it will feel even better once everything is fully integrated and tested,\u201d comments Cedric Lorant, EmTroniX co-founder and CEO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOnce JuRa is integrated with the rest of the Juventas CubeSat, and we perform remaining tweaks such as re-flashing it to the latest firmware, then we will assess how the instrument performs within its working environment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Planned to perform at least 45 hours of operations during the two-month working life of Juventas, JuRa incorporates some of the latest electronic components, but they had to undergo painstaking radiation testing ahead of delivery to ESA, because the space beyond Earth orbit is riven with charged particles that can degrade electronics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The JuRa radar design \u2013 developed in IPAG in partnership with the Chair for Radio Frequency and Photonics Engineering of Technical University Dresden \u2013 is derived from a previous space radar flown on ESA\u2019s Rosetta mission, which plumbed the depths of comet 67P\/Churyumov\u2013Gerasimenko.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
IPAG has also worked on radar systems for other space missions including NASA\u2019s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and ESA\u2019s Juice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cJuRa is a small, low-frequency, radar for a small body, compared to the bigger instruments we have put together for planetary targets,\u201d adds Alain. \u201cAs with Rosetta around 67P, we take advantage of the fact we will be orbiting relatively slowly around the Dimorphos asteroid.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hera will be moving at a few metres per second around the asteroid. This means JuRa can compensate for its comparative lack of power by transmitting the same signal multiple times, boosting its overall signal to noise ratio. The signal is specifically encoded to support the disentangling of radar returns, harnessing an EmTroniX-designed software-defined radio digital signal processor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The full depth of radar penetration of JuRa\u2019s 60 MHz signal will depend on the consistency of Dimorphos. A more homogeneous interior will allow deeper sounding compared to a discontinuous rubble pile structure with big monoliths interspersed with empty voids.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The JuRa team has also been in discussion with ESA and other space agencies about the prospect of flying JuRa units to other asteroids, potentially including targeting the 2029 Earth flyby of the Apophis asteroid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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