SH41D-2397
Advanced In-Situ Detection and Chemical Analysis of Interstellar Dust Particles
Thursday, 17 December 2015
Poster Hall (Moscone South)
Zoltan Sternovsky1, AJ Gemer1, Eberhard Gruen2, Mihaly Horanyi3, Sascha Kempf3, Kurt Maute1, Frank Postberg4, Ralf Srama5, Ethan Williams1, Leela O'brien6 and J.R. R Rocha1, (1)Colorado Univ, Boulder, CO, United States, (2)Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, Boulder, CO, United States, (3)University of Colorado at Boulder, Physics, Boulder, CO, United States, (4)University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany, (5)University of Stuttgart, Stuttgart, Germany, (6)University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO, United States
Abstract:
The Ulysses dust detector discovered that interstellar dust particles pass through the solar system. The Hyperdsut instrument is developed for the in-situ detection and analysis of these particles to determine the elemental, chemical and isotopic compositions. Hyperdust builds on the heritage of previous successful instruments, e.g. the Cosmic Dust Analyzer (CDA) on Cassini. Hyperdust combines a highly sensitive Dust Trajectory Sensor (DTS) and the high mass resolution Chemical Analyzer (CA). The DTS will detect dust particles as small as 0.3 µm in radius, and the velocity vector information is used to confirm the interstellar origin and/or reveal the dynamics from the interactions within the solar system. The effective target area of the CA is > 600 cm2 achieves mass resolution in excess of 200, which is considerably higher than that of CDA, and is acheved by advanced ion optics design. The Hyperdust instrument is in the final phases of development to TRL 6.
