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Asked by news461rue to Darren on 12 Oct 2022.
Question: what do you have to consider when making space instruments
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Darren Yau answered on 12 Oct 2022:
Hi there
Good question as there are many considerations. Firstly you need to make sure the instrument works. This sounds obvious but the work I do involves miniaturising lab equipment that usually takes up a lot of space in a lab.
Next you need to make sure it works in extreme hot/cold conditions. Also during extreme vibration, shock and acoustic loads during launch.
Then you have to make sure it doesn’t weigh too much as it costs a lot of money to launch things into space. Too heavy and it’s not going to fly, literally!
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Chris commented on :
Good question! We need to first figure out what we want it to do – and to what performance.
Then we figure out the environment it will go to. Being around Earth is a lot ‘nicer’ than going to another planet. We have vibrations from the launch, then the temperature ranges (so we often use heaters), then we have the radiation environment itself. I.e. particles than can damage out instruments when we’re away from our Earth’s protective magnetic fields.