Telescience Support Unit onboard the FOTON Spacecraft

Paper number

IAC-06-A2.5.06

Author

Mr. Jimmy Thorstenson, Swedish Space Corporation, Sweden

Coauthor

Mr. Stefan Lundin, Swedish Space Corporation, Sweden

Coauthor

Mr. Francesco Grassini, European Space Agency (ESA)/ESTEC, The Netherlands

Coauthor

Mr. Daniele Titomanlio, Italy

Year

2006

Abstract

The TSU is conceived as a stand-alone module enabling the user to conduct telescience operations on experiment facilities on board the Russian FOTON Spacecraft. 

The main functions of the TSU is to; 1. Collect scientific telemetry and housekeeping data from the payloads and to forward it to users on ground. 2. To transport telecommands from the users to the payloads. 3. To collect digital video, compress the data, and forward this to ground in a format compatible with the communication system.

The TSU was successfully flown for the second time on the FOTON M2. The first flight of the TSU was on FOTON12, launched from Plesetsk, Russia in 1999. The TSU was also onboard the FOTON M1 mission, that unfortunately exploded after some 20 seconds of flight.

The FOTON M2 was the 11th ESA mission of its kind. The launch was performed from Baikonur, Russia, in late May 2005, and the mission duration was 15.5 days in orbit. The payload consisted of 39 different scientific experiments with a total payload mass of about 400 kg. The manifold experiments covered different scientific areas, such as biology, physical science and exobiology.

The FOTON M2 was operated from the Telesupport Control Centre and Science Centre, set up at Esrange facility outside Kiruna in northern Sweden. 

The FOTON M3 project is on going, and the mission is planned for autumn 2007, with a launch from Baikonur and with a mission duration similar to the FOTON M2. The M3 mission will also be operated from the Esrange facilities.

The TSU is located in the FOTON re-entry module. The TSU consists of four different subsystems; The Telescience Central Unit (TCU): containing telemetry formatting, telecommand decoding, stored command execution, power distribution and communication interfaces to the other subsystems as well as to the FOTON spacecraft. The Data Handling unit (DHU): containing interfaces to the scientific experiments, handles data compression and other related tasks. The Radio Frequency Unit (RFU): containing telemetry transmitter, command receiver, FM demodulator and filters. And finally the Antenna System: including deployment booms, radiating elements and hybrid ring.

For the upcoming FOTON M3 mission the TCU will be upgraded by a high speed telemetry encoding board, to provide encoding of four high speed data sources connected via SpaceWire to the TCU. The downlink telemetry encoding and the uplink command decoding will be compliant to the CCSDS standard. 

Abstract document

IAC-06-A2.5.06.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-06-A2.5.06.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

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