UK scientists gear up for NASA's latest mission - Solar Dynamics Observatory

UK scientists are gearing up for the launch of NASA's latest space mission, set to launch from Cape Canaveral at 15.30 GMT, on Tuesday, 9 February 2010. The Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) will deliver high resolution images of the Sun ten times better than the average High-Definition television to help scientists understand more about the Sun and its disruptive influence on services like communications systems on Earth. The UK, including scientists and engineers from the Science and Technology Facility Council's (STFC's) Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL), has provided essential expertise and technology to the mission.

Solar Dynamics Observatory spacecraft Credit: NASA

is the first mission in NASA's Living with a Star (LWS) programme. Its unique orbit will allow high resolution images to be recorded every three quarters of a second, providing in-depth information about the Sun's complex magnetic fields and space weather generated by solar flares and violent eruptions from the Sun's atmosphere known as Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs).

"A CME can carry a billion tonnes of solar material into space at over a million kilometres per hour. Such events can expose astronauts to deadly particle doses, can disable satellites, cause power grid failures on Earth and disrupt communications," said STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory scientist, Professor Richard Harrison. "The Sun's activity has a strong influence on the Earth. By studying solar activity, we hope to improve the prediction of solar storms and find new ways to protect technological systems here on Earth".

The UK's principal contribution is provision of the cameras for SDO and the data they produce. The high resolution cameras are at the heart of a set of US-led telescope systems which allow scientists to see features in the Sun's atmosphere on very small scales in time and space, and in many wavelengths simultaneously. The telescopes also allow detailed studies of solar magnetic fields and even of the nature of the solar interior.

"The cameras will give us new views of the Sun at a faster rate than ever before, and in exquisite detail, enabling us to find out what makes the Sun so hot and what causes the explosions in the Sun's atmosphere. This will produce more science data than any mission in NASA history," said Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) scientist, Professor Len Culhane.

RAL engineers designed and built the electronics systems for the six cameras on two of SDO's instruments. Under contract from, Lockheed Martin, they developed the electronics boxes which control and read out the data from SDO's cameras.

"Space missions require extremely light and compact, power-saving equipment which has to be built to stringent design and manufacturing requirements," said RAL's SDO Project Manager, Sarah Beardsley. "Inside each electronics box are four small, custom made video processing chips called ASICs (Application, Specific, Integrated Circuit). Each ASIC replaces a complete board of electronics which saves both space and power, and enables complex high speed parallel processing of data. The design of the electronics boxes has been so successful that we are now under contract to design, build and test the camera electronics for the SUVI instrument on NASA's forthcoming GOES-R weather satellite."

RAL's engineers also worked closely together with e2v Ltd, the UK company tasked with developing the unique Charged Couple Devices for SDO's cameras.

UK institutions involved in SDO are:

STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, provision of camera electronics boxes and SDO scientific co-investigator team
Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL), University College London, SDO scientific co-investigator team
University of Sheffield, SDO scientific co-investigator team
e2v Ltd, provision of CCDs

Source: British National Space Center