The SATRAM Timepix spacecraft payload in open space on board the Proba-V satellite for wide range radiation monitoring in LEO orbit

Abstract

The Space Application of Timepix based Radiation Monitor (SATRAM) is a spacecraft platform radiation monitor on board the Proba-V satellite launched in an 820km altitude low Earth orbit in 2013. The is a technology demonstration payload is based on the Timepix chip equipped with a 300µm silicon sensor with signal threshold of 8keV/pixel to low-energy X-rays and all charged particles including minimum ionizing particles. For X-rays the energy working range is 10–30keV. Event count rates can be up to 106cnt/(cm2s) for detailed event-by-event analysis or over 1011cnt/(cm2s) for particle-counting only measurements. The single quantum sensitivity (zero-dark current noise level) combined with per-pixel spectrometry and micro-scale pattern recognition analysis of single particle tracks enables the composition (particle type) and spectral characterization (energy loss) of mixed radiation fields to be determined. Timepix׳s pixel granularity and particle tracking capability also provides directional sensitivity for energetic charged particles. The payload detector response operates in wide dynamic range in terms of absorbed dose starting from single particle doses in the pGy level, particle count rate up to 106–10/cm2/s and particle energy loss (threshold at 150eV/µm). The flight model in orbit was successfully commissioned in 2013 and has been sampling the space radiation field in the satellite environment along its orbit at a rate of several frames per minute of varying exposure time. This article describes the design and operation of SATRAM together with an overview of the response and resolving power to the mixed radiation field including summary of the principal data products (dose rate, equivalent dose rate, particle-type count rate). The preliminary evaluation of response of the embedded Timepix detector to space radiation in the satellite environment is presented together with first results in the form of a detailed visualization of the mixed radiation field at the position of the payload and resulting spatial- and time-correlated radiation maps of cumulative dose rate along the satellite orbit.