Galileo, the European GNSS program, and LAGEOS

Abstract

With the ASI-INFN project “ETRUSCO-2 (Extra Terrestrial Ranging to Unified Satellite COnstellations-2)” we have the opportunity to continue and enhance the work already done with the former ETRUSCO INFN experiment. With ETRUSCO (2005-2010) the SCF LAB (Satellite/lunar laser ranging Characterization Facility LABoratory) team developed a new industry-standard test for laser retroreflectors characterization (the SCF-Test). This test is an integrated and concurrent thermal and optical measurement in accurately laboratory-simulated space environment. In the same period we had the opportunity to test several flight models of retroreflectors from NASA, ESA and ASI. Doing this we examined the detailed thermal behavior and the optical performance of LAGEOS (Laser GEOdynamics Satellites) cube corner retroreflectors and many others being used on the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) constellations currently in orbit, mainly GPS, GLONASS and GIOVE-A/GIOVE-B (Galileo In Orbit Validation Element) satellites, which deploy old-generation aluminium back-coated reflectors; we also SCFTested for ESA prototype new-generation uncoated reflectors for the Galileo IOV (In-Orbit Validation) satellites, which is the most important result presented here. ETRUSCO-2 inherits all this work and a new lab with doubled instrumentation (cryostat, sun simulator, optical bench) inside a new, dedicated 85m2 class 10000 (or better) clean room. This new project aims at a new revision of the SCF-Test expressly conceived to dynamically simulate the actual GNSS typical orbital environment, a new, reliable Key Performance Indicator for the future GNSS retroreflectors payload. Following up on this and using LAGEOS as a reference standard target in terms of optical performances, the SCF LAB research team led by S. Dell’Agnello is designing, building and testing a new generation of GNSS retroreflectors array (GRA) for the new European GNSS constellation Galileo.