Initial Calibration Results of the NIM Flight Spare Mass spectrometer for Exploration of Jupiter’s Icy Moons Exospheres

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martina Föhn ◽  
Marek Tulej ◽  
André Galli ◽  
Audrey Helena Vorburger ◽  
Davide Lasi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mass Spectrometer ◽  
Surface Composition ◽  
European Space Agency ◽  
Ion Source ◽  
Icy Moons ◽  
Neutral Particles ◽  
Neutral Gas ◽  
High Speeds ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Ionization Region

<p>The search for life is one of the key topics in modern space science. The JUICE mission of the European Space Agency ESA will investigate Jupiter and its icy moons Ganymede, Callisto and Europa, with Europa being an example of a potentially habitable world around a giant gas planet. The Particle and Environment Package, PEP, on board of the JUICE spacecraft will investigate Jupiter’s icy moons and their environment. The Neutral gas and Ion Mass spectrometer NIM will investigate the icy moon’s exospheres to investigate their formation and the interaction processes of the exospheres with the moons’ surface and Jupiter’s strong magnetic field. It will enhance our understanding of the processes involved in the interactions of ion bombardment on the icy moons' surfaces. From these measurements, we will derive the moons’ surface composition and their formation processes.</p><p>NIM is a time-of-flight mass spectrometer with two particle entrances: an open-source entrance to measure neutral particles and ions directly and a close source entrance where neutral particles get thermalized before entering the sensor’s ionization region. This allows detecting of particles with high speeds. NIM has a specially designed ion storage source and an ion-mirror to double the flight distance of the produced ions by keeping the sensor at a minimal size.</p><p>In this contribution, we show calibration results of the NIM flight spare instrument on one hand operated with laboratory and on the other operated with flight electronics. We demonstrate the performance of NIMs ion-source, verify the performance of the closed-source antechamber. NIM has a demonstrated mass resolution of m/Δm 800.</p>

Development of the NIM Mass spectrometer for Exploration of Jupiter’s Icy Moons Exospheres

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martina Föhn ◽  
Marek Tulej ◽  
André Galli ◽  
Audrey Helena Vorburger ◽  
Davide Lasi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mass Spectrometer ◽  
Surface Composition ◽  
Ion Source ◽  
High Mass ◽  
Performance Tests ◽  
Icy Moons ◽  
Neutral Particles ◽  
Set Constraints ◽  
Neutral Gas ◽  
Closed Source

<p>Investigation of habitable environments is one of the main objectives in upcoming space missions. The JUICE mission will investigate Jupiter’s environment in the solar system and its icy moons Ganymede, Callisto and Europa as examples for potentially habitable worlds around a gas giant. The Particle Environment Package (PEP) on the JUICE satellite will investigate Jupiter’s icy moons and their environment. As part of PEP, the Neutral gas and Ion Mass spectrometer (NIM) will measure the chemical composition of the exospheres of the icy moons. These measurements give information about the surface composition of the moons and will set constraints on their formation processes.</p><p>NIM is a Time of Flight mass spectrometer with two entrances for neutral particles and ions. The gas enters the instrument from spacecraft ram direction. With the open source neutral particles and ions enter the ionisation region directly. With the closed source neutral particles get thermalized using an antechamber before entering the ion source. Particles entering with higher velocity are therefore easier to detect through the antechamber.</p><p>Initial performance tests with the NIM Protoflight Model (PFM) were done. The storage capability of the ion source was tested, the functionality of the antechamber was verified and we measured masses up to 642 u to demonstrate the high-mass performance of NIM. Furthermore, different subunits of the NIM instrument were successfully tested, such as the redesigned ion source and flight electronics connected with the NIM sensor head.</p>

scholarly journals A comparison between the two lobes of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko based on D/H ratios in H2O measured with the Rosetta/ROSINA DFMS

2019 ◽  
Vol 489 (4) ◽  
pp. 4734-4740 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isaac R H G Schroeder ◽  
Kathrin Altwegg ◽  
Hans Balsiger ◽  
Jean-Jacques Berthelier ◽  
Michael R Combi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mass Spectrometer ◽  
European Space Agency ◽  
Cometary Nucleus ◽  
The Other ◽  
Appreciable Difference ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Close Proximity ◽  
Double Focusing ◽  
Comet 67P

ABSTRACT The nucleus of the Jupiter-family comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko was discovered to be bi-lobate in shape when the European Space Agency spacecraft Rosetta first approached it in 2014 July. The bi-lobate structure of the cometary nucleus has led to much discussion regarding the possible manner of its formation and on how the composition of each lobe might compare with that of the other. During its two-year-long mission from 2014 to 2016, Rosetta remained in close proximity to 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, studying its coma and nucleus in situ. Based on lobe-specific measurements of HDO and H2O performed with the ROSINA Double Focusing Mass Spectrometer (DFMS) on board Rosetta, the deuterium-to-hydrogen (D/H) ratios in water from the two lobes can be compared. No appreciable difference was observed, suggesting that both lobes formed in the same region and are homogeneous in their D/H ratios.

scholarly journals 16O/18O ratio in water in the coma of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko measured with the Rosetta/ROSINA double-focusing mass spectrometer

2019 ◽  
Vol 630 ◽  
pp. A29 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isaac R. H. G. Schroeder I ◽  
Kathrin Altwegg ◽  
Hans Balsiger ◽  
Jean-Jacques Berthelier ◽  
Johan De Keyser ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Mass Spectrometer ◽  
European Space Agency ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Close Proximity ◽  
Terrestrial Water ◽  
Double Focusing ◽  
Comet 67P ◽  
Almost Continuous

The European Space Agency spacecraft Rosetta accompanied the Jupiter-family comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko for over 2 yr along its trajectory through the inner solar system. Between 2014 and 2016, it performed almost continuous in situ measurements of the comet’s gaseous atmosphere in close proximity to its nucleus. In this study, the 16O/18O ratio of H2O in the coma of 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, as measured by the ROSINA DFMS mass spectrometer onboard Rosetta, was determined from the ratio of H216O/H218O and 16OH/18OH. The value of 445 ± 35 represents an ~11% enrichment of 18O compared with the terrestrial ratio of 498.7 ± 0.1. This cometary value is consistent with the comet containing primordial water, in accordance with leading self-shielding models. These models predict primordial water to be between 5 and 20% enriched in heavier oxygen isotopes compared to terrestrial water.

scholarly journals Mass spectrometry of planetary exospheres at high relative velocity: direct comparison of open- and closed-source measurements

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Meyer ◽  
Marek Tulej ◽  
Peter Wurz
Keyword(s):  
Open Source ◽  
Noble Gases ◽  
Mass Range ◽  
Ion Source ◽  
Thermal Mode ◽  
Icy Moons ◽  
Neutral Gas ◽  
Major Interest ◽  
Potential Habitats ◽  
Closed Source

Abstract. The exploration of habitable environments on or inside icy moons around the gas giants in the solar system is of major interest in upcoming planetary missions. Exactly this theme is addressed by the JUpiter ICy moons Explorer (JUICE) mission of ESA, which will characterise Ganymede, Europa and Callisto as planetary objects and potential habitats. We developed a prototype of the Neutral Gas and Ion Mass spectrometer (NIM) of the Particle Environment Package (PEP) for the JUICE mission intended for composition measurements of neutral gas and thermal plasma. NIM/PEP will be used to measure the chemical composition of the exospheres of the icy Jovian moons. Besides direct ion measurement, the NIM instrument is able to measure the inflowing neutral gas in two different modes: in neutral mode, where the gas enters directly the ion source (open source), and in thermal mode, where the gas gets thermally accommodated to the wall temperature by several collisions inside an equilibrium sphere, called antechamber, before entering the ion source (closed source). We performed measurements with the prototype NIM using a neutral gas beam of 1 up to 4.5 km s−1 velocity in the neutral and thermal mode. The current trajectory of JUICE foresees a flyby velocity of 4 km s−1 at Europa; other flybys are in the range of 1 up to 7 km s−1 and orbital velocity in Ganymede orbits is around 2 km s−1. Different species are used for the gas beam, such as noble gases Ne, Ar, Kr as well as molecules like H2, methane, ethane, propane and more complex ones. The NIM prototype was successfully tested under realistic JUICE mission conditions. In addition, we find that the antechamber (closed source) behaves as expected with predictable density enhancement over the specified mass range and within the JUICE mission phase velocities. Furthermore, with the open source and the closed source we measure almost the same composition for noble gases, as well as for molecules, indicating no additional fragmentation of the species recorded with the antechamber for the investigated parameter range.

Juno Diagnosis of Magnetospheric Dynamics at Jupiter with Energetic Neutral Atoms

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry Mauk ◽  
George Clark ◽  
Frederic Allegrini ◽  
Fran Bagenal ◽  
Scott Bolton ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Neutral Atom ◽  
European Space Agency ◽  
Space Environment ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Polar Regions ◽  
Icy Moons ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Orbiting Spacecraft ◽  
Proper Interpretation ◽  
Juno Mission

<p>Energetic Neutral Atom (ENA) cameras on orbiting spacecraft at Earth and Saturn have helped greatly to diagnose these complex magnetospheres. Within this decade, the European Space Agency’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) mission will arrive at Jupiter and make ENA imaging a major thrust in helping to understand its complex magnetosphere. The present polar-orbiting Juno mission carries no ENA camera, but the energetic particle JEDI instrument is serendipitously sensitive to ENA’s with energies > 50 keV, provided there are no charged particles in the environment to mask their presence. Juno offers great service to the interpretation of both past and future ENA imaging with its orbit allowing unique viewing perspectives. Here we report on several components of ENA emissions that can probe the dynamical state of the regions involved, including the space environment of the orbit of Io, that of Europa, and Jupiter itself. A special focus here will be new observations of ENA emissions from Jupiter’s polar regions, the proper interpretation of which may end up being unique to the Juno mission, even after the JUICE mission.</p>

The Particle Environment Package on board JUICE: What Can We Learn about Callisto's Atmosphere and Space Environment?

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
André Galli ◽  
Audrey Vorburger ◽  
Shane R. Carberry Mogan ◽  
Elias Roussos ◽  
Gabriella Stenberg-Wieser ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Model Development ◽  
European Space Agency ◽  
Recent Model ◽  
Space Environment ◽  
Operation Planning ◽  
Origin And Evolution ◽  
Icy Moons ◽  
Plasma Environment ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Science Operation

<p class="western">The JUpiter ICy moons Explorer (JUICE) of the European Space Agency will investigate Jupiter and its icy moons Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto, with the aim to better understand the origin and evolution of our Solar System and the emergence of habitable worlds around gas giants. The Particle Environment Package (PEP) on board JUICE is designed to measure neutrals, ions, electrons, and energetic particles over an energy range from eV to MeV.</p> <p class="western" lang="de-DE"><span lang="en-US">In the vicinity of Callisto, PEP will characterize the Jovian plasma environment and the outer parts of Callisto’s atmosphere and ionosphere. Roughly twenty Callisto flybys with closest approaches between 200 km and 5000 km altitude are planned over the course of the JUICE mission. This study aims at optimizing the scientific insight gained from the foreseen flybys by combining the input from the PEP science team and operation planning with recent model efforts for Callisto’s atmosphere, the plasma environment and the production of Energetic Neutral Atoms. The results of this study will inform both science operation planning of PEP and JUICE and they will guide future model development for Callisto’s atmosphere, ionosphere, and their interaction with the plasma environment.</span></p>

A mass spectrometer for studying chemical reactions

1963 ◽  
Vol 274 (1358) ◽  
pp. 285-292 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Electron Beam ◽  
Gas Phase ◽  
Mass Spectrometer ◽  
Ion Source ◽  
Line Of Sight ◽  
Pyrolysis Products ◽  
Ionization Region ◽  
Differential Pumping ◽  
Hot Filament ◽  
Phase Chemical

This paper describes a mass spectrometer designed to study gas-phase chemical kinetics. An ion source has been constructed which incorporates a differentially pumped, electron beam filament chamber, and line-of-sight access from the sampling pinhole to the ionization region. Experiments are described which test the effectiveness of differential pumping in reducing contamination of the sample by pyrolysis products formed from the sample on the hot filament.

The Comet Interceptor Mission

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geraint Jones ◽  
Colin Snodgrass ◽  
Cecilia Tubiana ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Surface Composition ◽  
European Space Agency ◽  
Thermal Design ◽  
Mission Design ◽  
The Sun ◽  
Solar Wind Interaction ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Short Period ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
First Time

<p>Comets are undoubtedly extremely valuable scientific targets, as they largely preserve the ices formed at the birth of our Solar System. In June 2019, the multi-spacecraft project Comet Interceptor was selected by the European Space Agency, ESA, as its next planetary mission, and the first in its new class of Fast (F) projects [Snodgrass, C. and Jones, G. (2019) Nature Comms. 10, 5418]. The Japanese space agency, JAXA, will make a major contribution to Comet Interceptor. The mission’s primary science goal is to characterise, for the first time, a yet-to-be-discovered long-period comet (LPC), preferably one which is dynamically new, or an interstellar object. An encounter with a comet approaching the Sun for the first time will provide valuable data to complement that from all previous comet missions, which visited short period comets that have evolved over many close approaches to the Sun. The surface of Comet Interceptor’s LPC target will be being heated to temperatures above the its constituent ices’ sublimation point for the first time since its formation.</p> <p>Following launch, in 2029, the spacecraft will be delivered with the ESA Ariel mission to the Sun-Earth L2 Lagrange Point , a relatively stable location suitable for later injection onto an interplanetary trajectory to intersect the path of its target. This allows a relatively rapid response to the appearance of a suitable target comet, which will need to cross the ecliptic plane in an annulus which contains Earth’s orbit.</p> <p>A suitable new comet would be searched for from Earth prior to launch, and after launch if necessary, with short period comets serving as a backup destinations. With the advent of powerful facilities such as the Vera Rubin Observatory, the prospects of finding a suitable comet nearing the Sun are very promising. The possibility may exist for the spacecraft to encounter an interstellar object if one is found on a suitable trajectory.</p> <p>An important consequence of the mission design is that the spacecraft must be as flexible as possible, i.e. able to cope with a wide range of target activity levels, flyby speeds, and encounter geometries. This flexibility has significant impacts on the spacecraft solar power input, thermal design, and dust shielding that can cope with dust impact speeds ranging from around 10 to 70 km/s, depending on the target comet’s orbital path.</p> <p>Comet Interceptor has a multi-spacecraft architecture: it is expected to comprise a main spacecraft and two probes, one provided by ESA, the other by JAXA, which will be released by the main spacecraft when approaching the target. The main spacecraft, which would act as the primary communication point for the whole constellation, would be targeted to pass outside the hazardous inner coma, making remote and in situ observations on the sunward side of the comet. The two probes will be targeted closer to the nucleus and inner coma region.</p> <p>Planned measurements of the target include its nucleus surface composition, shape, and structure, its dust environment, and the composition of the gas coma. A unique, multi-point ‘snapshot’ measurement of the comet- solar wind interaction region is to be obtained, complementing single spacecraft observations made at other comets.</p> <p>We shall describe the science drivers, planned observations, and the mission’s instrument complement, to be provided by consortia of institutions in Europe and Japan.</p>

scholarly journals Mass spectrometry of planetary exospheres at high relative velocity: direct comparison of open- and closed source measurements

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Meyer ◽  
Marek Tulej ◽  
Peter Wurz
Keyword(s):  
Open Source ◽  
Noble Gases ◽  
Mass Range ◽  
Ion Source ◽  
Thermal Mode ◽  
Icy Moons ◽  
Neutral Gas ◽  
Major Interest ◽  
Potential Habitats ◽  
Closed Source

Abstract. The exploration of habitable worlds inside icy moons around the gas giants in the Solar System is of major interest in upcoming planetary missions. Exactly this theme is addressed by the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) mission of ESA, which will characterise Ganymede, Europa and Callisto as planetary objects and potential habitats. We developed a prototype of the Neutral gas and Ion Mass spectrometer (NIM) of the Particle Environment Package (PEP) for the JUICE mission intended for composition measurements of neutral gas and thermal plasma. NIM/PEP will be used to measure the chemical composition of the exospheres of the icy Jovian moons. Besides direct ion measurement, the NIM instrument is able to measure the inflowing neutral gas in two different modes: in neutral mode the gas enters directly the ion source (open source) and in thermal mode where the gas gets thermally accommodated to the wall temperature by several collisions inside an equilibrium sphere, called antechamber, before entering the ion-source (closed source). We performed measurements with the prototype NIM using a neutral gas beam of 1 up to 4.5 km s−1 velocity in the neutral and thermal mode. The current trajectory of JUICE foresees a flyby velocity of 4 km s−1 at Europa, other flybys are in the range of 1 up to 7 km s−1 and orbital velocity in Ganymede orbits is around 2 km s−1. Different species are used for the gas beam, such as noble gases Ne, Ar, Kr as well as molecules like H2, methane, ethane, propane and more complex ones. The NIM prototype was successfully tested under realistic JUICE mission conditions. In addition, we find that the antechamber (closed source) behaves as expected with predictable density enhancement over the specified mass range and within the JUICE mission phase velocities. Furthermore, with the open source and the closed source we measure almost the same composition for noble gases, as well as for molecules, indicating no additional fragmentation of the species recorded with the antechamber for the investigated parameter range.

scholarly journals CASPA-ADM: a mission concept for observing thermospheric mass density

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Siemes ◽  
Stephen Maddox ◽  
Olivier Carraz ◽  
Trevor Cross ◽  
Steven George ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mass Spectrometer ◽  
Mass Density ◽  
Rapid Development ◽  
European Space Agency ◽  
Cold Atom ◽  
Atmospheric Composition ◽  
Sensor Technology ◽  
Space Agency ◽  
Gas Surface Interactions ◽  
Spectrometer Data

AbstractCold Atom technology has undergone rapid development in recent years and has been demonstrated in space in the form of cold atom scientific experiments and technology demonstrators, but has so far not been used as the fundamental sensor technology in a science mission. The European Space Agency therefore funded a 7-month project to define the CASPA-ADM mission concept, which serves to demonstrate cold-atom interferometer (CAI) accelerometer technology in space. To make the mission concept useful beyond the technology demonstration, it aims at providing observations of thermosphere mass density in the altitude region of 300–400 km, which is presently not well covered with observations by other missions. The goal for the accuracy of the thermosphere density observations is 1% of the signal, which will enable the study of gas–surface interactions as well as the observation of atmospheric waves. To reach this accuracy, the CAI accelerometer is complemented with a neutral mass spectrometer, ram wind sensor, and a star sensor. The neutral mass spectrometer data is considered valuable on its own since the last measurements of atmospheric composition and temperature in the targeted altitude range date back to 1980s. A multi-frequency GNSS receiver provides not only precise positions, but also thermosphere density observations with a lower resolution along the orbit, which can be used to validate the CAI accelerometer measurements. In this paper, we provide an overview of the mission concept and its objectives, the orbit selection, and derive first requirements for the scientific payload.

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