Spacecraft charging effects

Abstract

This paper gives an overview of electrostatic charging which occurs on spacecraft in different plasma environments. Particular emphasis is given to differential charging between sunlit and shadowed insulated surfaces, a phenomenon which is often observed in the geostationary orbit. It can generate potential differences of several kilovolts between adjacent surfaces. This can lead to discharges and serious spacecraft anomalies such as spurious telecommands caused by voltage and current transients on cable harnesses. Experience with the GEOS and ISEE satellites has demonstrated that differential charging can be avoided by making outer surface elements conductive and connecting them to a common ground.

Does Ring Current Heating Generate the Observed O+ Shell?

“…In this letter, we describe initial modeling that tests the hypothesis that this “cold” O + population represents an outflow of heated O + ions from the topside ionosphere with the ring current being a viable heat source. By “cold,” we mean a thermal (Maxwellian) particle population with a temperature below the typical threshold (a few eV, in the plasmasphere) for direct detection due to spacecraft charging (Grard et al., 1983). Storm‐generated ring current ions have energies in the 1–100 keV range (Daglis et al., 1999).…”

A Mission to Test the Pioneer Anomaly: Estimating the Main Systematic Effects

“…Notice that the primary craft is also attracted towards the passive sphere; however, since this acceleration is much smaller than the inverse (by a factor m sphere /m craf t = 200), the relative acceleration is well approximated by the above. The first obtained limit, although extremely high, may sometimes occur in space environs, particularly during nightside magnetospheric storms [10], where the potential can reach approximately 20 kV olt.…”

“…However, since this acceleration is much smaller than the inverse (by a factor m sphere /m craf t = 200), the relative acceleration is well-approximated by the above. The first obtained limit, although extremely high, may sometimes occur in space environs, particularly during nightside magnetospheric storms, 11 where the potential can reach approximately 20 kV. From the above, some guidelines for controlling the effect of Coulomb forces may be sketched.…”

Dynamic Feasibility Study of a Tethered Coulomb Structure

“…For this study a photoelectron current of J 0pe = 20 µAm −2 will be used along with a mean energy T P e = 2 eV. 11,31,37,39,40 These values are chosen to represent typical spacecraft materials and give a conservative indication of the effect of photoelectron currents on TCS power requirements. The photoelectron current is computed from only the sun-lit surface (half-sphere).…”