Hera mission: Tiny radar to probe core of asteroid Dimorphos
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The European Space Agency (ESA) has received one of the payloads of its Hera mission, which is slated for a 2024 launch.
The Juventas CubeSat will be outfitted with a small, high-tech radar — slightly bigger than the coffee mug.
Despite the small size, this instrument has been designed to perform an extraordinary task: the first radar imaging of the asteroid Dimorphos core.
Since NASA conducted the first-ever planetary defense test on it, this Great Pyramid-sized space rock has been in the limelight.
Called the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), in this dramatic impact test, a high-speed spacecraft crashed into asteroid Dimorphos to change its trajectory.
Radar can function for 45 hours in total
According to the official release, the Juventas will peer up to 100 meters deep beneath the 160-meter-diameter Dimorphos moonlet.
Juventas is a "6-unit" CubeSat measuring 10x20x30 cm, whereas this radar called "JuRa" measures 9.5x9.5x9.5 cm.
Its small size allows it to fit within a single CubeSat unit, coupled with four 1.5-meter-long radar antennae. Astronika, a Polish company, created the small radar device.
The JuRa instrument can run for at least 45 hours in a two-month period, which is the mission life of Juventas.
The advanced JuRa is outfitted with some of the most latest electrical components. Prior to delivery to ESA, the company conducted extensive radiation testing to assess its durability in the severe deep space environment, which is blasted with charged particles that may destroy electronics.
The smallest #radar flown in space - a bit bigger than a coffee mug - will be hosted on #HeraMission's #Juventas #CubeSat, to perform the first internal probe of an #asteroid. Target: #Dimorphos, whose orbit was nudged by @NASA's #DARTMission last year https://t.co/nmIJ4JEnU0 pic.twitter.com/XFQhtgqN2r
— ESA Technology (@ESA_Tech) August 10, 2023
"JuRa is a small, low-frequency, radar for a small body, compared to the bigger instruments we have put together for planetary targets. As with Rosetta around 67P, we take advantage of the fact we will be orbiting relatively slowly around the Dimorphos asteroid,” said Alain Hérique, the instrument's principal investigator at the University Grenoble Alpes in France.
Juventas’ movement speed around the asteroid will be a few meters per second, allowing JuRa to function with less power by blasting the same signal numerous times. Using specialized software the signal is particularly encoded to facilitate the disentanglement of radar returns.
“The full depth of radar penetration of JuRa's 60 MHz signal will depend on the consistency of Dimorphos. A more homogeneous interior will allow deeper sounding compared to a discontinuous rubble pile structure with big monoliths interspersed with empty voids,” explained the ESA release.
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