ESA's Distributed Space weather Sensor System (D3S) has the objective of providing data for now- and forecasting of space weather and observing space weather effects. Due to the multitude of observable and needed measurement locations, D3S is a system of systems, implemented through hosted payload missions as well as dedicated small missions. Currently 5 instrument are providing near-realtime...
In the context of the ESA/M-MATISSE mission, the French Institute for Research in Astrophysics and Planetology (IRAP) has initiated the development of SPAM, a particle detector instrument to be deployed on two Mars-orbiting spacecraft. Designed to characterize both electrons and ions in the Martian environment, SPAM targets an energy range of 30 keV to 1 MeV for electrons and 30 keV to 10 MeV...
Augura Space has developed the Augura Space Nowcast Platform, an open-access, research-oriented tool designed to support the space weather scientific community by providing centralized access to key space environment parameters in near-real time.
The platform consolidates publicly available data from European and international providers focusing on solar wind, interplanetary magnetic field,...
The plasma environment in the inner Earth’s magnetosphere fills a vast region between Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and Geostationary Orbit (GEO) and varies significantly with solar and geomagnetic conditions on the time scales of minutes. Spacecraft surface charging is a serious concern for satellites at those orbits leading to anomalies of operations. Spacecraft charging is a function of the space...
Ionizing radiation measurements of primary and secondary sources on small satellites is currently limited to a very small number of detector types with poor energy resolution and timing characteristics and very limited geometry. SF develops a modular system that overcomes these limitations within the technological constraints of the small satellite platform and deliver high performance...
ASTRA-LEO (Advanced Spaceborne Telescope for Radiation Analysis in Low Earth Orbit) is a multi-particle radiation detector currently being developed by the Centre for Space Sensors and Systems (CENSSS) at the University of Oslo and integrated into the CENSSAT-1 CubeSat, scheduled for launch in 2027. The instrument is designed to detect Solar Energetic Particles (SEPs), observe Gamma-Ray Bursts...
We present the results from the space mission VZLUSAT-2, where our novel space dosimetry system based on the SpacePix2 chip was successfully tested in orbit. The detector system operated continuously over an extended period, demonstrating stable performance in low Earth orbit and providing valuable data on the space radiation environment. The system’s ability to distinguish between different...
HEPI is a new instrument developed to measure >300 MeV/nuc particles in a very small (‘< 1U’) package which would be suitable for a CubeSat mission as well as for hosting on larger missions. It uses the principle of Cherenkov radiation which is one of the earliest techniques used in space radiation measurements, for example the cosmic ray detector on the first UK satellite, Ariel-1. Although...
Since the 1960s, cosmic dust particles in the solar system have been investigated in situ using dust impact instruments on spacecraft near Earth and in planetary space. These particles, largely stemming from comets and from asteroid collisions, can occur in cometary streams or are more dispersed into the zodiacal dust cloud. Also interstellar dust moves through the solar system as the solar...
Electrostatic discharges (ESDs) are a known cause of satellite anomalies, particularly during disturbances in the radiation belts. While design guidelines to evaluate and mitigate ESD and electromagnetic coupling (EMC) risks have traditionally focused on large platforms, there is now a need to tailor these guidelines to the unique characteristics of smaller platforms, such as CubeSats.
This...
NUSES is an innovative space mission proposed and co-ordinated by the Gran Sasso Science Institute (GSSI) in collaboration with INFN, several academic institutions, and Thales Alenia Space Italy (TAS-I).
The project features two main scientific payloads: Ziré and Terzina.
Ziré is designed to measure the energy spectra of low-energy cosmic and gamma rays, high-energy astrophysical neutrinos,...
The RadMap Telescope is a compact instrument designed to characterize the primary spectrum of cosmic-ray nuclei and the secondary radiation field created by their interaction with the shielding of spacecraft. Its main purpose is to precisely monitor the radiation exposure of astronauts, and it is the first instrument with a compact form factor that can measure both the charge and energy of...
This presentation will provide an overview of the Scalable Radiation Monitors for Advancing Space Exploration (RadMon-on-ISS) experiment, which will be deployed onboard the European Columbus module of the International Space Station (ISS) as part of the first Polish technological and scientific mission – IGNIS, under the Ax-4 commercial crew mission, with Polish project astronaut Sławosz...
Silicon photomultipliers (SiPM) are increasingly used in space missions for the detection of near-UV, optical, and infrared light due to their compact design, low cost, low power consumption, robustness, and high photo-detection efficiency, which makes them sensitive to single photons. Although SiPMs outperform traditional photomultiplier tubes in many areas, concerns about their radiation...
Selene’s Explorer for Roughness, Regolith, Resources, Neutrons and Elements (SER3NE) is a small lunar orbiter mission led by UiO, aiming on mapping the global composition of solids and volatiles and thus the elemental abundance of the lunar surface in unprecedented spatial resolution. One of the instruments onboard is the Gamma-Ray-including-Neutrons Spectrometer GRiNS, a hybrid radiation...
The Norwegian Radiation Monitor (NORM) is a compact, single particle-telescope-based radiation monitor developed for measuring energetic electrons and protons in space environment. NORM has been designed as an easily adaptable space radiation monitor for satellite missions in GEO, LEO, and HEO.
The first NORM unit, flying aboard the Arctic Satellite Broadband Mission (ASBM), provides...
The Space Application of Timepix Radiation Monitor (SATRAM) was launched into space in May 2013 onboard the Proba-V satellite of the European Space Agency into a low Earth orbit (820km, Sun-synchronous) and it has been operating ever since. The SATRAM module is equipped with a Timepix chip featuring a 300 μm-thick silicon sensor divided into a 256 x 256 pixel matrix with 55 μm pixel pitch....
The 3D Energetic Electron Spectrometer (3DEES) has been designed as a compact science-class instrument that is optimised for the measurement of angle-resolved electron spectra in the energy range 0.1 - 10 MeV in the Earth’s radiation belts. However, it also allows to quantify proton fluxes in the energy range 2.5 to 50 MeV. It has been developed within a consortium including the Belgian...
The RADiation-hard Electron Monitor (RADEM) was launched aboard the European Space Agency (ESA), JUpiter ICy moons Explorer (JUICE) on April 14th, 2023. JUICE is scheduled to arrive at the Jovian system in 2031 after an eight-year cruise. RADEM is part of the JUICE platform payload, and for that reason, will be on during the entire cruise and nominal phases of the mission. To characterize the...
Internal charging of large mission satellites is due to galactic cosmic rays and solar particles in the energy range above tens of MeV/n.
Long-, short-term variations of galactic cosmic rays and solar energetic particle events play a relevant role in reducing the sensitivity of space missions. In particular we focus on the ESA Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) and LISA-like...
Energetic charged-particle environment can be monitored and spectroscopically analyzed with newly developed copper-halide thin-film scintillators. These films are synthesized of perovskite materials that exhibit strong blue luminescence even in polycrystalline form. This provides facile and low-budget production technology, structural flexibility and stability, as well as high tolerance to...
The miniaturized MiniPIX-Timepix3 Space radiation monitor is deployed in open space in LEO orbit onboard the OneWeb JoeySat (launched May 2023, initially at 600 km, currently at 1200 km polar orbit) to monitor and characterize the complex radiation field in the satellite environment. The pixel detector is implemented in miniaturized electronics MiniPix-Timepix3 Space (Advacam) of size 95 mm ×...
The presentation will demonstrate the development of a small universal HardPix radiation detector based on the Timepix3 pixel detectors in IEAP CTU launched into space in 2023 and 2025. Requirements analysis, modular architecture design for a wide range of applications and space missions. Component selection with respect to extreme environment durability, size, power consumption, price and...
A short review of how SES has operated small environment sensors on our satellite fleet, followed by aspirations for flying additional sensors in the future - and some comments regarding the difficulties in doing this for a commercial operator. Finally, as a little light relief - some examples of how 'inadvertent sensors' - such as attitude control sensors and flight computer EDAC - can be...
Multilayer or Z-graded radiation shielding has been proposed to reduce the weight of satellite radiation shielding in comparison to conventional aluminium shielding. Especially for CubeSats, which are mass and volume-constrained and rely on non-radiation hard commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components, multilayer shielding could enable longer mission durations and missions to higher orbits....
This is an ongoing ESA PRODEX project, the overall objective of this project is a proof-of-concept that a VLF transmitter, with a magnetic loop/solenoid antenna on a LEO satellite, is capable of transmitting wave power in the Very-Low-Frequency and at an amplitude range comparable to the typically observed peak power of the naturally occurring whistler-mode waves (whistler, chorus, hiss) in...
As humanity prepares for a return to the lunar surface, understanding and monitoring the lunar radiation environment is more important than ever. Despite the renewed focus on missions, the lunar radiation environment has only been measured a handful of times—mainly during flybys (Lunar reconnaissance orbiter and Chandrayaan-1) and lander missions (chang’E-4 Lander). These data are spatially...
Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPM) are a good candidate when designing the readout for modern scintillator detectors for ionizing particles, both for space-borne and Earth-based devices, due to their lower operating voltage and power consumption. A major issue, however, is that high radiation environments may degrade SiPM performance due to defects accumulating within the silicon crystal lattice....
Space environment is a mixed environment where ions, protons and electrons coexist, with energies from a few keV to a few hundred MeV. Most radiation monitors used to measure fluxes in the space environment are based on solid-state detectors (SSD). These instruments use the total energy deposited in a sensitive volume by a particle to identify its nature and incident energy. However, protons...
Recent decades have seen the return of first measurements of the radiation environment from Mars’s orbit and surface. However, due to platform specific limitations, measurements from current orbital radiation monitors and spectrometers lack spatial resolution while the measurements from conventional rovers result in a lack of surface coverage. Moreover, interesting variations in the cosmic and...
