#Testing NASA’s IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe)

[michaelgabrill]

Testing NASAs IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe)

NASA’s IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe) is loaded into the X-ray and Cryogenic Facility (XRCF) thermal vacuum chamber at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, in this photo from March 20, 2025. There, the spacecraft will undergo testing such as dramatic temperature changes to simulate the harsh environment of space. The IMAP […] from NASA https://ift.tt/1xOg670

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

IMAP arrives at NASA Marshall for testing in XRCF

On March 18, NASA's IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe) arrived at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, for thermal vacuum testing at the X-ray and Cryogenic Facility, which simulates the harsh conditions of space.

The IMAP mission is a modern-day celestial cartographer that will map the solar system by studying the heliosphere, a giant bubble created by the sun's solar wind that surrounds our solar system and protects it from harmful interstellar radiation.

Testing performed in the X-ray and Cryogenic Facility will help to assess the spacecraft before its journey toward the sun. The IMAP mission will orbit the sun at a location called Lagrange Point 1 (L1), which is about 1 million miles from Earth toward the sun.

From this location, IMAP can measure the local solar wind and scan the distant heliosphere without background from planets and their magnetic fields. The mission will use its suite of 10 instruments to map the boundary of the heliosphere, analyze the composition of interstellar particles that make it through, and investigate how particles change as they move through the solar system.

Furthermore, IMAP will maintain a continuous broadcast of near-real-time space weather data from five instruments aboard IMAP that will be used to test new space weather prediction models and improve our understanding of effects impacting our human exploration of space.

While inside the Marshall facility, the spacecraft will undergo dramatic temperature changes to simulate the environment during launch, on the journey toward the sun, and at its final orbiting point.

The testing facility has multiple capabilities including a large thermal vacuum chamber which simulates the harsh conditions of space such as extreme temperatures and the near-total absence of an atmosphere. Simulating these conditions before launch allows scientists and engineers to identify successes and potential failures in the design of the spacecraft.

"The X-ray and Cryogenic Facility was an ideal testing location for IMAP given the chamber's size, availability, and ability to meet or exceed the required test parameters including strict contamination control, shroud temperature, and vacuum level," said Jeff Kegley, chief of Marshall's Science Test Branch.

The facility's main chamber is 20 feet in diameter and 60 feet long, making it the 5th largest thermal vacuum chamber at NASA. It's the only chamber that is adjoined to an ISO 6 cleanroom—a controlled environment that limits the number and size of airborne particles to minimize contamination.

The IMAP mission will launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, no earlier than September.

IMAGE: NASA’s IMAP mission was loaded into NASA Marshall’s XRCF thermal vacuum chamber where the spacecraft will undergo testing such as dramatic temperature changes to simulate the harsh environment of space. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Princeton/Ed Whitman

[monterplant]

Testing NASA’s IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe)

NASA’s IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe) is loaded into the X-ray and Cryogenic Facility (XRCF) thermal vacuum chamber at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, in this photo from March 20, 2025. There, the spacecraft will undergo testing such as dramatic temperature changes to simulate the harsh environment of space. The IMAP […] Continue reading Testing…

[sciencespies]

SpaceX wins launch contract for NASA space science mission

https://sciencespies.com/space/spacex-wins-launch-contract-for-nasa-space-science-mission/

SpaceX wins launch contract for NASA space science mission

WASHINGTON — NASA has selected SpaceX to launch a space science mission and several secondary payloads, the latest in a series of wins by SpaceX for NASA science missions.

NASA announced Sept. 28 it awarded a contract to SpaceX for the launch of its Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) spacecraft in 2024 from Cape Canaveral on a Falcon 9. The total value of the contract, covering launch and other “mission related costs,” is $109.4 million.

IMAP is a mission NASA selected for development in 2018 as part of its Solar Terrestrial Probes program. It will operate at the L-1 Lagrange point, 1.5 million kilometers from the Earth in the direction of the sun, to the study the boundary of the sun’s heliosphere with interstellar space, and to measure the generation of cosmic rays.

The launch will also carry several secondary payloads as part of a NASA initiative to take advantage of excess capacity on science missions. Those payloads include NASA’s Lunar Trailblazer smallsat, which will orbit the moon to look for water ice, and NOAA’s Space Weather Follow-On L-1 mission, a space weather monitoring mission that, like IMAP, will operate at the L-1 point. Two additional NASA heliophysics “missions of opportunity,” yet to be selected, will also be on the launch.

The contract is the latest in a string of victories for SpaceX in competitions to launch NASA science satellites. Those awards, though, have had a wide range of contract values, even for the same class of launch vehicle.

SpaceX won a contract in April 2019 for the launch of NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission in 2021 worth $69 million. Three months later, the company won a contract for the launch of the Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer smallsat, valued at $50.3 million. In February, it won a contract for the launch of the Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem spacecraft worth $80.4 million.

All three of those launches, like the IMAP mission, will use Falcon 9 rockets. One reason the IMAP mission may be more expensive than the others is the higher complexity of the mission, which includes several secondary payloads going to both the L-1 point and the moon.

The value of the IMAP contract only slightly less than SpaceX’s first Falcon Heavy contract with NASA, for the Psyche asteroid mission, awarded in February. That contract is worth $117 million.

#Space

[michaelgabrill]

NASAs IMAP Arrives at NASA Marshall For Testing in XRCF

On March 18, NASA’s IMAP (Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe) arrived at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, for thermal vacuum testing at the X-ray and Cryogenic Facility, which simulates the harsh conditions of space. The IMAP mission is a modern-day celestial cartographer that will map the solar system by studying the heliosphere, a […] from NASA https://ift.tt/fswuBL9

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

NASA's IMAP instrument installations complete

With the installation of a charged particle detector on Dec. 3, 2024, all 10 of NASA's Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) science instruments have been fully integrated on the spacecraft.

Slated to launch no earlier than September 2025, IMAP will map the boundaries of the heliosphere—the protective bubble surrounding the sun and planets that is inflated by the constant stream of particles from the sun called the solar wind.

As a modern-day celestial cartographer, IMAP will also explore and chart the vast range of particles in interplanetary space, helping to investigate two of the most important overarching issues in heliophysics: the energization of charged particles from the sun and the interaction of the solar wind with interstellar space.

IMAP plans to provide near real-time information about the solar wind to provide advanced space weather warnings from its location at Lagrange point 1, one million miles from Earth toward the sun.

To achieve these goals, IMAP will use 10 science instruments built by multiple organizations and integrated at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland. The instruments, listed in order by when they were integrated, are:

Interstellar Dust Experiment (IDEX): a mass spectrometer studying interstellar dust and interplanetary dust particles, designed and built by the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder, Colorado.

IMAP Magnetometer (MAG): a pair of identical magnetometers that measure the magnetic field near the spacecraft, designed and built by Imperial College London.

IMAP-Ultra: two high-energy-range energetic neutral atom (ENA) imagers designed and built at APL.

High-energy Ion Telescope (HIT): a high-energy ion imager designed and built by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

Solar Wind Electron (SWE) instrument: maps electrons from the solar wind in three dimensions, designed and built by the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in collaboration with the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI).

GLObal Solar Wind Structure (GLOWS) instrument: a Lyman-alpha photometer that measures the ultraviolet glow from interstellar hydrogen and helium to investigate the solar wind and studies its evolution over time, designed and built by the Space Research Center of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, Poland.

Solar Wind and Pickup Ion (SWAPI) instrument: measures ions from the solar wind and particles from beyond the solar system, designed and built by Princeton University.

IMAP-Hi: two medium-energy-range ENA imagers to help advance our understanding of the evolution of the outer heliosphere, designed and built by LANL in collaboration with SwRI, the University of New Hampshire (UNH), and the University of Bern in Switzerland.

IMAP-Lo: a low-energy-range ENA imager mounted on a pivot platform to help advance our understanding of the evolution of the outer heliosphere, designed and built by UNH in collaboration with SwRI, APL, and the University of Bern.

Compact Dual Ion Composition Experiment (CoDICE): measures the distributions and composition of interstellar pickup ions (charged particles that make it through the boundary of the heliosphere), designed and built by SwRI.

The integrated spacecraft is now running through a series of operations simulating the launch and postlaunch environments to ensure the spacecraft can withstand the rigors of space. While at APL, IMAP will also undergo a vibration and separation shock test, which replicates the launch vehicle separating from the spacecraft after takeoff.

IMAGE: IMAP will use 10 instruments to explore and chart the vast range of particles in interplanetary space. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Princeton/Ed Whitman

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Solar wind plasma sensor to help track space weather

The Southwest Research Institute-developed Solar Wind Plasma Sensor (SWiPS) has been delivered and integrated into a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellite dedicated to tracking space weather. SWiPS will measure the properties of ions originating from the Sun, including the very fast ions associated with coronal mass ejections that interact with the Earth’s magnetic environment.

NOAA’s Space Weather Follow On-Lagrange 1 (SWFO-L1) satellite will orbit the Sun at approximately a million miles from Earth, at a point known as L1. The satellite will remotely image the Sun and make local measurements of the solar wind, high-energy particles and the interplanetary magnetic field. SwRI not only developed SWiPS but also will support operations and data analysis, with the goal of providing advance warning of space weather events. These phenomena can affect technology such as GPS and power grids as well as the safety of astronauts who could be exposed to high levels of radiation.

“The delivery and integration of SWiPS is the culmination of four years of hard work by a very dedicated and talented team. I couldn’t be prouder of this group,” said Dr. Robert Ebert, a staff scientist in SwRI’s Space Science Division and SWiPS principal investigator. “The measurements made by SWiPS will provide advance warning in real-time of phenomena associated with space weather before they arrive in the space environment near Earth.”

SWiPS was successfully integrated with the SWFO-L1 spacecraft, which is now undergoing environmental testing. Measurements of the solar wind ion velocity, density and temperature provided by SWiPS, along with information from the SWFO-L1 magnetometer, also built by SwRI, will allow NOAA to predict the severity of geomagnetic storms.

“The SWiPS sensor design is based on the Ion and Electron Sensor flown on ESA’s comet mission, Rosetta,” said SwRI’s Prachet Mokashi, the SWiPS project manager. “The compact design, low resource requirements and advanced data production make this instrument optimal for the SWFO-L1 and other similar missions.”

A traditional strength of SwRI’s Space Science Division is the design and fabrication of instruments to measure space plasmas. These dilute ionized gases populate the immediate space environments of the Earth and other solar system bodies as well as interplanetary space.

The SWiPS project started shortly after staff from SwRI and other organizations were urged to work primarily from home due to COVID-19. “Designing and developing a complex instrument such as this was especially challenging when we couldn’t get the engineers in the same room, and supply chains were disrupted. But we persevered to build the flight instrument and successfully test it before delivery to NASA,” said Michael Fortenberry, the system engineer for SWiPS and a director in the Space Systems Division at SwRI.

NASA, which manages the mission for NOAA, plans to launch SWFO-L1 in 2025 as a rideshare with the Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) mission on a SpaceX launch vehicle. SwRI also plays a key role in that mission, managing the payload and providing a scientific instrument to help analyze and map particles streaming from the edge of interstellar space and to help understand particle acceleration near Earth.

IMAGE: SwRI staff prepare the Solar Wind Plasma Sensor (SWiPS) for integration into a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellite dedicated to tracking space weather. SWiPS will measure the properties of ions originating from the Sun, including the very fast ions associated with coronal mass ejections that interact with the Earth’s magnetic environment. Credit Southwest Research Institute

[michaelgabrill]

NASA Selects Heliophysics Missions of Opportunity for Space Science Research and Technology Demonstration

NASA has selected two SmallSat missions – a study of Earth’s outer most atmosphere and a solar sail spaceflight test mission – to share a ride to space in 2025 with the agency’s Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP). from NASA https://ift.tt/3qsvqAs