Charge-Coupled Device Television Camera For Nasa's Galileo Mission To Jupiter

Abstract

The slow -scan television camera being built for NASA's Galileo Jupiter Orbiter spacecraft consists of a 1500 mm focal -length telescope coupled to a camera head housing a newly developed 800 x 800 element charge -coupled device (CCD) detector based on "virtual-phase" charge transfer technology. This detector results in a broadband sensitivity over 100 times that of a comparable vidicon -tube camera while also yielding improved resolution, linearity, geometric fidelity, and spectral range. In the near -Jovian radiation belts, interactions of high-energy particles with the silicon CCD result in the production of unwanted charge, and special techniques have been implemented (e.g., tantalum and quartz shielding, rapid image readout, and 2 x 2 picture -element on -chip averaging) to ensure adequate signal -to -noise performance for images acquired as close to Jupiter as five planetary radii. The images returned from Galileo will provide high -resolution (approximately 1 km) mapping coverage of most of the surface of the four large Galilean satellites of Jupiter with coverage of selected targets at resolutions as good as about 20 m. The broad spectral range of the instrument (0.4 to 1.1 pm) and the use of special methane -absorption -band filters in the near -infrared will allow study of the Jovian atmospheric structure and dynamics. Excellent off -axis light rejection and high sensitivity of the instrument will permit study of low -light -level phenomena such as lightning and aurorae on Jupiter and the Jovian ring.

The Control Networks of the Galilean Satellites and Implications for Global Shape

“…Results of these measurements are presented in Table II. Zharkov et al (1985) give an expression for the Love The C 22 Gravitational Coefficients of the Satellites number k 2 of a satellite as h 2 are given in Table II. Thus, it is possible to make more accurate and repeatable the Galileo Europa mission will more accurately define both their gravitational fields and shapes.…”

“…The pixel size is about 15 Ȑm for the Voyager of the coordinates, while the errors in z were generally smaller. The overdetermination was 2.2. cameras and 15.24 Ȑm for the Galileo camera (Davies et al 1979, Klaasen et al 1984.…”

Thermal signature, eruption style, and eruption evolution at Pele and Pillan on Io

“…Details of the solid-state imaging (SSI) experiment have been previously published by Klaasen et al [1984Klaasen et al [ , 1997 and Belton et al [1992]. As its name suggests, the SSI utilizes a solid-state charge-coupled device (CCD) detector attached to a telescope with a focal length of 1.5 m. The instantaneous field of view (IFOV) is 10 mrad, yielding a spatial resolution -50 times higher than NIMS.…”

Calibration and performance of the Galileo solid-state imaging system in Jupiter orbit

“…1 Originally J was set to 34. Based on the data from the first two orbits, our original model for the radiation noise rate was increased by a factor of 1.6 at 9.4R J and below transitioning to a factor of 1.4 at 15R J and above by changing the value of J to 54 below 9.4R J transitioning to 46 above 15R J .…”

“…1,2 A previous publication documented the SSI inflight calibration and performance characteristics and how they have evolved during the 6-yr cruise to Jupiter. 3 In this paper, we describe the performance of the SSI during Jupiter orbital operations.…”