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|1 November 2004|
SMART-1 is the first mission in ESA’s Small Missions for Advanced Research in Technology programme, hence the SMART acronym. These are missions designed to test key technologies, in preparation for their later use on major scientific missions.
The purpose of SMART-1 is to test a number of key technologies while performing an unprecedented scientific study of the Moon. One of its principal tests is solar-electric propulsion. This is a form of continuous low-thrust engine that uses electricity derived from solar panels to produce a beam of charged particles. This beam can be expelled from the spacecraft, so pushing it forward. Such engines are commonly called ion engines.
SMART-1 is the first European mission to the Moon. Despite a concerted effort by the Americans during the 1960s and early 1970s, which culminated in six successful manned landings, and the more recent Clementine and Lunar Prospector missions, the Moon remains a place of mystery and scientific intrigue.
While cruising from Earth to the Moon, SMART-1:
Now at the Moon, SMART-1 is:
SMART-1 data could also be used to select sites for future landing and moon exploration.
This complicated and slow journey was necessary because ion engines do not provide the instant power that chemical rockets do. However, because they are more efficient and require little fuel, ion engines are more flexible and allow space probes to reach places where chemical rockets would not be able to go. ESA is investing in this technology so that it can mount missions to Mercury and the Sun in the decade beginning 2010.
After being captured by the Moon, SMART-1 looped over the north and south poles, in an elliptical orbit whose height ranges from 300 to 3 000 kilometres. During its scientific mission, it will use the ion engine to gradually lower its highest altitude.
Launch: 27 September 2003
Electric Propulsion Diagnostic Package - EPDP EPDP is fed by a selection of sensors, mounted on the outside of the spacecraft. It is designed to monitor the ion engine's effects on the spacecraft. Ion-engine technology can cause surface temperatures to rise and create unwanted electric currents on the spacecraft, so it must be carefully watched.
Principal Investigator: Giovanni Noci, Laben Proel, Italy
Scientific co-ordinator: José Gonzales, ESA Electric Propulsion Unit, ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands
Spacecraft Potential, Electron and Dust Experiment - SPEDE SPEDE consists of two electrical sensors mounted on the ends of 60-centimetre booms fixed to the outside of the spacecraft. They, too, monitor the effects of the solar-electric propulsion on the spacecraft. During SMART-1's cruise phase, the experiment mapped the plasma-density distribution around Earth and, when SMART-1 is in lunar orbit, it will study how the solar wind affects the Moon.
Principal Investigator: Anssi Malkki, Finnish Meteorological Institute Helsinki, Finland
The experiment was built jointly by FMI (Helsinki, Finland), ESA/SSD (Noordwijk, The Netherlands), IRFU (Uppsala, Sweden), and KTH (Stockholm, Sweden).
X/Ka-band Telemetry and Telecommand Experiment - KaTE Using very sensitive receivers onboard the spacecraft, KaTE tests new digital radio communications technology. It demonstrates, for the first time on a science mission, the performance of a new higher range of communication frequencies in the X-band (8 GHz) and Ka-band (32/34 GHz). It also tests new data encoding techniques (Turbo code) used to validate the corresponding ground-based infrastructure needed to receive these signals.
Principal investigator: Detlef Heuer, Astrium GmbH, Germany, in association with TTC and Radio Navigation Section, Electrical Department, ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands
Radio Science Investigation with SMART-1 - RSIS RSIS uses KaTE and AMIE to perform a painstaking investigation into the way the Moon wobbles. This is the first time a spacecraft in orbit has performed such an experiment. It is therefore an essential test for future missions, such as BepiColombo, that will investigate Einstein's Theories of Relativity.
Principal Investigator: Luciano Iess and Giovani Palmerini, University of Rome, Italy in association with TTC and Radio Navigation Section, Electrical Department, ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands
Laser Link experiment Demonstrating the use of a continuous laser beam to point a spacecraft from Earth for future communication purposes. It is the first European test of a laser connection between Earth and a spacecraft travelling at deep space distances. SMART-1 used the AMIE camera to spot the laser beam emitted by the ground station at Tenerife (Canaries Islands, Spain).
Principal Investigator: Zoran Sodnik, Senior Optical Engineer, Optics Section, Mechanical Systems Department, ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands
On-board Autonomous Navigation - OBAN OBAN used AMIE (below) to gather images of celestial objects such as Earth, the Moon, and asteroids, to work out exactly where SMART-1 is in space. This is the first step towards a spacecraft that will be able to navigate for itself.
Principal Investigator: Finn Ankersen, guidance, navigation and control analyst at ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, in cooperation with the European Space Operations Centre (J. Fertig), ESOC in Darmstadt, Germany
Asteroid-Moon Micro-Imager Experiment - AMIE AMIE is a miniature camera, capable of taking colour images and storing them in a memory. It can perform some automatic image processing. As well as imaging the Moon, AMIE supports the Laser-Link experiment and OBAN and it will assist with RSIS. AMIE's lunar images are used for educational and science communication as well.
Principal Investigator: Jean-Luc Josset, Space-X, Centre Suisse d'Electronique et de Microtechnique (CSEM) in Neuchatel, Switzerland, leading a team from seven other European industrial or academic establishments.
Infrared exploration of the lunar surface - SIR SIR will perform a detailed analysis of the Moon's surface composition. It will provide greater insight into the processes of the crater and maria formation and the phenomenon of 'space weathering' on the Moon's surface.
Principal Investigator: Uwe Keller, Max Planck Institute für Aeronomie, Germany. He is leading a consortium including Carl Zeiss, Jena and tec5, Frankfurt, Germany.
Demonstration of a Compact Imaging X-ray Spectrometer - D-CIXS D-CIXS will provide the first global map of the lunar surface's composition. Its observations will allow scientists to confirm theories on the evolution of lunar terrains and will provide clues to the origin of the Moon. This is a test instrument for a similar investigation of Mercury, using ESA's BepiColombo mission.
Principal Investigator: Manuel Grande, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, United Kingdom
X-ray Solar Monitor - XSM XSM will monitor the Sun's output of X-rays so that solar storms do not confuse the results from D-CIXS, and it will observe the Sun as an X-ray star during the cruise.
Principal Investigator: Juhani Huovelin, University of Helsinki Observatory, Finland
Octavio Camino, SMART-1 Operations Manager
Johannes Schoenmaekers, SMART-1 Flight Dynamics Engineer
Richard Lumb, STOC Manager
ESA Project Manager: Giuseppe Racca
ESA Project Scientist: Bernard Foing
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