Creating a highly flexible and autonomous stratospheric observatory: the essential elements of the European Stratospheric Balloon Observatory payload control software

Vernoosfaderani, Mahsa Taheran; Maier, Philipp; Pahler, Andreas; Bougueroua, Sarah; Klinkner, Sabine; Krabbe, A.; Völker, Tibor; Ackermann, Justin; Ångermann, M.

doi:10.1117/12.2629883

Cited by 2 publications

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“…Figure 11: Architecture of ESBO onboard and ground system from a computational perspective [9] On the ground side, payload operations benefit from the generic MCS tool called RAMSES, for general commanding and monitoring of payload. We have an additional Grafana-based tool with custom plugins to supervise telescope pointing, and monitor sun and moon avoidance angles in real time.…”

Section: Software Development and Testsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Status, flight preparation, and future instrument opportunities of the STUDIO balloon-borne telescope platform

Bougueroua

Ångerman

Barnstedt

et al. 2022

Ground-Based and Airborne Telescopes IX

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The Stratospheric UV Demonstrator of an Imaging Observatory (STUDIO) is a balloon-borne platform designed and built to carry different astronomical instruments or telescopes. It thereby offers an accessible and affordable platform for observations in atmosphere-constrained wavelength ranges. In its current setup, it houses an imaging micro-channel plate (MCP) detector on a 0.5 m aperture telescope. The first flight of this setup is planned during the summer turnaround conditions over Esrange, Sweden, in the 2023 or 2024 season. This mission will act as a demonstrator and technical test for the versatile and scalable astronomical platform as well as for the aforementioned MCP instrument. If successful, it will furthermore allow first scientific studies of variable hot compact stars and flaring M-dwarf stars within the galactic plane.In this paper, we present the design and current status of testing of the STUDIO platform, particularly including environmental tests of the optical elements, on-sky tests of the gondola attitude control system, and simulation results of the image stabilization system. We furthermore describe the planned system tests as part of the flight preparation. As an outlook, we present details on how the platform can be used to fly different instruments or telescopes, including potential flight routes and science opportunities.

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Section: Software Development and Testsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Figure 12: Breakdown of ESBO flight software components [9] The development of the payload control software is described in detail in "Taheran Vernoosfaderani, M. et al" [9] Proc. of SPIE Vol.…”

Section: Software Development and Testsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Status, flight preparation, and future instrument opportunities of the STUDIO balloon-borne telescope platform

Bougueroua

Ångerman

Barnstedt

et al. 2022

Ground-Based and Airborne Telescopes IX

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Microchannel plate detectors for ultraviolet astronomy

Diebold,

Barnstedt,

Bluhm

et al. 2024

Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2024: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray

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Beyond the lifetime of the Hubble Space Telescope, observational access to the ultraviolet (UV) might be quite limited. Therefore, small missions with short development times are required to bridge the gap to future larger missions in this important wavelength range. Even with the progress in adapting silicon sensors for the UV, single-photon-counting and visible-blind microchannel plate (MCP) detectors can provide a competitive signalto-noise performance, particularly in the far-and extreme-UV, and enable simple instrument designs for small and cheap missions.Our MCP detector development aims at reaching enhanced sensitivity and increased lifetime with lower size, mass, and power consumption. Therefore, the design comprises (Al)GaN photocathodes with a tunable long-wavelength cut-off, long-life borosilicate MCPs, and a cross-strip anode with an FPGA-based readout.In this contribution, we report on the overall status of the detector development and give an outlook on the mission prospects.

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Creating a highly flexible and autonomous stratospheric observatory: the essential elements of the European Stratospheric Balloon Observatory payload control software

Cited by 2 publications

References 0 publications

Status, flight preparation, and future instrument opportunities of the STUDIO balloon-borne telescope platform

Status, flight preparation, and future instrument opportunities of the STUDIO balloon-borne telescope platform

Microchannel plate detectors for ultraviolet astronomy

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