Analysis of the accuracy of actuation electronics in the laser interferometer space antenna pathfinder

Armano, M.; Audley, H.; Baird, J.; Born, M.; Bortoluzzi, D.; Cardines, N.; Castelli, E.; Cavalleri, A.; Cesarini, A.; Cruise, A. M.; Danzmann, K.; Silva, M. de Deus; Dixon, G. J.; Dolesi, R.; Ferraioli, L.; Ferroni, V.; Fitzsimons, E.; Freschi, M.; Gesa, L.; Giardini, Domenico; Gibert, F.; Giusteri, R.; Grimani, C.; Grzymisch, J.; Harrison, I.; Hartig, Marie-Sophie; Heinzel, Gerhard; Hewitson, M.; Hollington, D.; Hoyland, D.; Hueller, M.; Inchauspé, H.; Jennrich, O.; Jetzer, Philippe; Karnesis, Nikolaos; Kaune, B.; Killow, C. J.; Korsakova, Natalia; López-Zaragoza, J. P.; Maarschalkerweerd, R.; Mance, D.; Martín, Vicente; Martin-Polo, L.; Martino, J.; Martín-Porqueras, F.; Mateos, I.; McNamara, P. W.; Mendes, José F. G.; Mendes, L.; Meshksar, N.; Nofrarias, M.; Paczkowski, S.; Perreur-Lloyd, M.; Pivato, P.; Plagnol, E.; Ramos‐Castro, J.; Reiche, J.; Rivas, F.; Robertson, D. I.; Russano, G.; Slutsky, J.; Sopuerta, Carlos F.; Sumner, T. J.; Texier, D.; Pierick, Jan ten; Thorpe, James; Vetrugno, D.; Vitale, S.; Wanner, Gudrun; Ward, H.; Wass, Peter; Weber, William J.; Wissel, L.; Wittchen, A.; Zweifel, Peter

doi:10.1063/1.5140406

Cited by 17 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…We assume electronics heritage from the LPF design, which has been led by ETH Zurich [22][23][24]. Capacitive position sensing is provided by a resonant capacitive-inductive bridge, sketched at right in Figure 2 [4,22], relying on a highly balanced differential transformer ( ∆L L < 50 ppm) for intrinsically high common-mode rejection in the comparison of AC currents flowing from the TM into pairs of opposing sensing electrodes.…”

Section: Strawman Grs Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…, in order to maintain the actuation force gradient "stiffness" constant and to limit force-torque cross-coupling for an off-center TM. This constant stiffness audio carrier actuation architecture was recognized as necessary early in the LISA Pathfinder development [4] and was implemented in LPF using α and β sine/cosine waveforms at different frequencies for the 6 actuation DOF [24].…”

Section: Strawman Grs Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If the µm/s 2 actuation forces allowed in this design by a ±50 V AC range are indeed sufficient for the geodesy applications, the simplification to a single range electronics is worth considering. Considering the 17-bit resolution of the LPF electronics-roughly 150 µV in a ±10 V AC science range [24]-and expanding this to a ±50 V range, the amplitude LSB would also increase by a factor 5 to 750 µV. For use in science acquisition without any drag-free compensation, electrostatic compensation of g c ≈ 300 nm/s 2 would require roughly 10 V amplitude applied voltages.…”

Section: Electrostatic Force Actuationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The relevant "acceleration LSB" is roughly 2g c ∆V V ≈ 50 pm/s 2 . This appears large compared to the pm/s 2 /Hz 1/2 level and requires more detailed control analysis, but in extracting the "external" gravitational accelerations, such as for geodesy (see Appendix A) or LPF [2,24,25], the critical performance driver is not the resolution of the actuator quantization but rather the accuracy with which the actuator force is calculated. If necessary for the controller, a high frequency "dithering" of the force command could also be used in a Σ − ∆ controller, if necessary, to effectively average to a higher resolution.…”

Section: Electrostatic Force Actuationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Application of LISA Gravitational Reference Sensor Hardware to Future Intersatellite Geodesy Missions

et al. 2022

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Like gravitational wave detection, inter-spacecraft geodesy is a measurement of gravitational tidal accelerations deforming a constellation of two or more orbiting reference test masses (TM). The LISA TM system requires TM in free fall with residual stray accelerations approaching the fm/s2/Hz1/2 level in the mHz band, as demonstrated in the LISA Pathfinder “Einstein’s geodesic explorer” mission. Current geodesy missions are limited by accelerometers with 100 pm/s2/Hz1/2 level, due to intrinsic design limitations, as well as the challenging low Earth orbit environment and operating conditions. A reduction in the TM acceleration noise could lead to an important improvement in the scientific return of future geodesy missions focusing on mass change, especially in a scenario with multiple pairs of geodesy satellites. We present here a preliminary assessment of how the LISA TM system, known as the “gravitational reference sensor” (GRS), could be adapted for use in future geodesy missions aiming at residual TM accelerations noise at the pm/s2/Hz1/2 level, addressing the major design issues and performance limitations. We find that such a performance is possible in a geodesy GRS that is simpler and smaller than that used for LISA, with a lighter, sub-kg TM and gaps reduced from 4 mm to less than 1 mm. Acceleration noise performance limitations will likely be closely tied to the required levels of applied actuation forces on the TM.

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Section: Strawman Grs Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Strawman Grs Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Electrostatic Force Actuationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Electrostatic Force Actuationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Application of LISA Gravitational Reference Sensor Hardware to Future Intersatellite Geodesy Missions

et al. 2022

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“…The Office National d'Etudes et de Recherches Aérospatiales (ONERA) has developed it with a performance of 10 −7 pF/Hz 1/2 level above 0.01 Hz [6]. A terrific stable capacitive sensing circuit of the bandwidth down to 0.1 mHz has carefully been studied [7][8][9][10] for space gravitational wave detection mission LISA, and in-flight tests have achieved the anticipated goal at mHz bandwidth in LISA Pathfinder mission [11,12]. In our lab, a similar capacitive position transducer has also been developed, the effect of the excitation frequency in differential capacitive sensing, the prototype sensing circuit, and a pre-scanning and adjustment method are investigated, respectively [13][14][15][16].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Investigation on Stray-Capacitance Influences of Coaxial Cables in Capacitive Transducers for a Space Inertial Sensor

Wang

et al. 2020

Sensors

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Ultra-sensitive inertial sensors are one of the key components in satellite Earth’s gravity field recovery missions and space gravitational wave detection missions. Low-noise capacitive position transducers are crucial to these missions to achieve the scientific goal. However, in actual engineering applications, the sensor head and electronics unit usually place separately in the satellite platform where a connecting cable is needed. In this paper, we focus on the stray-capacitance influences of coaxial cables which are used to connect the mechanical core and the electronics. Specially, for the capacitive transducer with a differential transformer bridge structure usually used in high-precision space inertial sensors, a connecting method of a coaxial cable between the transformer’s secondary winding and front-end circuit’s preamplifier is proposed to transmit the AC modulated analog voltage signal. The measurement and noise models including the stray-capacitance of the coaxial cable under this configuration is analyzed. A prototype system is set up to investigate the influences of the cables experimentally. Three different types and lengths of coaxial cables are chosen in our experiments to compare their performances. The analysis shows that the stray-capacitance will alter the circuit’s resonant frequency which could be adjusted by additional tuning capacitance, then under the optimal resonant condition, the output voltage noises of the preamplifier are measured and the sensitivity coefficients are also calibrated. Meanwhile, the stray-capacitance of the cables is estimated. Finally, the experimental results show that the noise level of this circuit with the selected cables could all achieve 1–2 × 10−7 pF/Hz1/2 at 0.1 Hz.

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Impact dynamics of a free-falling reference test mass in space

Vignotto,

Bortoluzzi

2024

International Journal of Impact Engineering

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Analysis of the accuracy of actuation electronics in the laser interferometer space antenna pathfinder

Cited by 17 publications

References 9 publications

Application of LISA Gravitational Reference Sensor Hardware to Future Intersatellite Geodesy Missions

Application of LISA Gravitational Reference Sensor Hardware to Future Intersatellite Geodesy Missions

Investigation on Stray-Capacitance Influences of Coaxial Cables in Capacitive Transducers for a Space Inertial Sensor

Impact dynamics of a free-falling reference test mass in space

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