Demonstration of highly integrated payload architectures and instrumentation for future planetary missions

Abstract

Future planetary missions will require advanced, smart, low resource payloads (P/Ls) and satellites 1,2 to enable the exploration of the solar system in a more frequent, timely and multi-mission manner with reasonable cost. The concept of highly integrated payload architectures was introduced during the re-assessment of the payload of the BepiColombo Mercury Planetary Orbiter 3 . Considerable mass and power savings were achieved throughout the instrumentation by better definition of the instruments design, higher integration and identification of resource drivers 4 . Higher integration and associated synergy effects permit optimisation of the payload performance at minimum resource requirements while meeting demanding science requirements. This promising concept has been applied to a set of hypothetical Planetary Technical Reference Studies 11 (PTRS) on missions to Venus 5 , Jupiter/Europa 6 , Deimos 7 , Mars 8 and the investigation of the Interstellar Heliopause 9 . The needs on future instrumentation were investigated for these mission concepts and potential instruments were proposed 10 . A demonstration programme is now proposed in form of an elegant breadboard that consists of a photon counting laser altimeter, a stereoscopic high resolution camera, and a broadband radiometric mapping spectrometer. The aim of the activity is to demonstrate to feasibility of such a miniaturised, low resource and highly integrated payload based on innovative instrument designs. The activity shall thereby provide a clear detailed definition of the technical and managerial aspects for implementation into potential future planetary space science missions.