The Mercury Laser Altimeter Instrument for the MESSENGER Mission

被引:0
作者
John F. Cavanaugh
James C. Smith
Xiaoli Sun
Arlin E. Bartels
Luis Ramos-Izquierdo
Danny J. Krebs
Jan F. McGarry
Raymond Trunzo
Anne Marie Novo-Gradac
Jamie L. Britt
Jerry Karsh
Richard B. Katz
Alan T. Lukemire
Richard Szymkiewicz
Daniel L. Berry
Joseph P. Swinski
Gregory A. Neumann
Maria T. Zuber
David E. Smith
机构
[1] NASA Goddard Space Flight Center,
[2] Swales Aerospace,undefined
[3] Orbital Sciences,undefined
[4] Space Power Electronics,undefined
[5] Massachusetts Institute of Technology,undefined
来源
Space Science Reviews | 2007年 / 131卷
关键词
Mercury; MESSENGER; Topography; Laser altimeter;
D O I
暂无
中图分类号
学科分类号
摘要
The Mercury Laser Altimeter (MLA) is one of the payload science instruments on the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) mission, which launched on August 3, 2004. The altimeter will measure the round-trip time of flight of transmitted laser pulses reflected from the surface of the planet that, in combination with the spacecraft orbit position and pointing data, gives a high-precision measurement of surface topography referenced to Mercury’s center of mass. MLA will sample the planet’s surface to within a 1-m range error when the line-of-sight range to Mercury is less than 1,200 km under spacecraft nadir pointing or the slant range is less than 800 km. The altimeter measurements will be used to determine the planet’s forced physical librations by tracking the motion of large-scale topographic features as a function of time. MLA’s laser pulse energy monitor and the echo pulse energy estimate will provide an active measurement of the surface reflectivity at 1,064 nm. This paper describes the instrument design, prelaunch testing, calibration, and results of postlaunch testing.
引用
收藏
页码:451 / 479
页数:28
相关论文
共 20 条
[1]  
Abshire J.B.(2000)undefined Appl. Optics 39 2449-2460
[2]  
Sun X.(2007)undefined Space Sci. Rev. 34 503-549
[3]  
Afzal R.S.(2002)undefined J. Geodyn. 23 1053-1068
[4]  
Chin G.(1998)undefined Phys. Chem. Earth 44 1715-1718
[5]  
Degnan J.J.(2007)undefined Space Sci. Rev. 49 1156-1163
[6]  
Garvin J.(2005)undefined Appl. Optics 44 1748-1760
[7]  
Hawkins S.E.(2002)undefined IEEE Trans. Nucl. Sci. 279 1686-1692
[8]  
Krebs D.J.(2005)undefined Appl. Optics 311 53-1465
[9]  
Novo-Gradac A.M.(1998)undefined Science 49 1445-7797
[10]  
Li S.X.(2006)undefined Science 97 7781-446