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Image: Jupiter antenna that came in from the cold
Written by Copernical Team Tuesday, 01 June 2021 10:30-
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An instrument destined for Jupiter orbit is checked after completing eight days of cryogenic radio-frequency testing at ESA's ESTEC technical center in the Netherlands.
The Sub-millimeter Wave Instrument of ESA's Juice mission will survey the churning atmosphere of Jupiter and the scanty atmospheres of its Galilean moons.
Testing took place in ESA's custom-built Low-temperature Near-field Terahertz chamber , or Lorentz.
The first chamber of its kind, the 2.8-m diameter Lorentz chamber can perform high-frequency radio-frequency testing in realistic space conditions, combining space-quality vacuum with ultra-low temperatures.
"The successful test of the flight hardware inside Lorentz, follows an intensive commissioning phase." says ESA antenna engineer Paul Moseley. "This demonstration opens up a wide range of testing possibilities for missions to come."
Meanwhile the flight model of the SWI instrument's parent Juice spacecraft has itself reached the ESTEC Test Center, in preparation for a month long thermal vacuum test campaign.
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Provided by European Space Agency
Citation: Image: Jupiter antenna that came in from the cold (2021, June 1) retrieved 1 June 2021 from https://phys.org/news/2021-06-image-jupiter-antenna-cold.html