Science Objectives of the Ganymede Laser Altimeter (GALA) for the JUICE Mission

Laser altimetry is a powerful tool for addressing the major objectives of planetary physics and geodesy, and have been applied in planetary explorations of the Moon, Mars, Mercury, and the asteroids Eros, and Itokawa. The JUpiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE), led by European Space Agency (ESA), has started development to explore the emergence of habitable worlds around gas giants. The Ganymede Laser Altimeter (GALA) will be the first laser altimeter for icy bodies, and will measure the shape and topography of the large icy moons of Jupiter, (globally for Ganymede, and using flyby ground-tracks for Europa and Callisto). Such information is crucial for understanding the formation of surface features and can tremendously improve our understanding of the icy tectonics. In addition, the GALA will infer the presence or absence of a subsurface ocean by measuring the tidal and rotational responses. Furthermore, it also improves the accuracy of gravity field measurements reflecting the interior structure, collaborating with the radio science experiment. In addition to range measurements, the signal strength and the waveform of the laser pulses reflected from the moon's surface contain information about surface reflectance at the laser wavelength and small scale roughness. Therefore we can infer the degrees of chemical and physical alterations, e.g., erosion, space weathering, compaction and deposition of exogenous materials, through GALA measurements without being affected by illumination conditions. JUICE spacecraft carries ten science payloads including GALA. They work closely together in a synergistic way with GALA being one of the key instruments for understanding the evolution of the icy satellites Ganymede, Europa, and Callisto.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in Trans. JSASS Aerospace Tech. Japa

Miniaturized Laser Altimeter for Small Satellite Applications

Laser Altimetry is a powerful tool to create absolutely calibrated digital terrain maps of planetary surfaces, to analyze their surface geology, and to get insight into the interior structure of planetary bodies by measuring tidal elevations and libration amplitudes and frequencies. The recent ESA missions BepiColombo and the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) carry the first European laser altimeter instruments, i.e., the BepiColombo Laser Altimeter (BELA) and the Ganymede Laser Altimeter (GALA), the latter of which has a strong contribution from JAXA teams. The measurement principle of a laser altimeter is very simple. It is based on the time-of-flight measurement of an optical pulse. BELA, which is now on the way to Mercury orbit, applies a diode-laser pumped Nd:YAG laser sending pulses with an energy of 50 mJ, a width of about 5 ns, and a repetition rate of 10 Hz. Over typical ranging distances of 400 km to more than 1000 km, the BELA telescope collects pulses with a few hundred photons and a width of about 25 ns where the time of arrival gives the mean topographic altitude of the area illuminated by the 5 to 40 m diameter laser beam. The return pulse width further gives information on slope and roughness within this area. GALA is a similar instrument with 17 mJ pulse energy but 30 Hz repetition rate and was launched in April 2023 to enter the Jovian system after a eight-year cruise to fly-by at Europa and Callisto and finally orbit the Jovian moon Ganymede at an altitude of about 500 km above its icy surface. BELA and GALA are instruments that consume about 50 W and have a mass of close to 15 kg and 25 kg, respectively. The instrument dimensions are largely determined by the telescope diameter of about 30 cm. In order to enable the use of these instruments on small satellites the size, weight and power (SWaP) budgets need to be drastically reduced. This can be achieved by deriving the time-of-flight information from just a single return photon. The reduction factor of about 100 in the detected photon number can be shared by a reduction in laser energy and a reduction of telescope aperture diameter. Our aim is to reduce laser pulse energy from 17 mJ to 1 mJ and telescope diameter from 22 cm (for GALA) to 8 cm which implies in total a reduction factor about 130. GALA typically detects 700 photons per pulse at an altitude of 500 km which leads to about 5 photons to be analyzed per event by a single photon detection laser altimeter. The major challenges for a single photon detection laser altimeter are the reduction of the background photon rate by reducing the field-of-view of the telescope as well as better spectral filtering. We present first results from a conceptual experimental study of such a system designed for use on small satellites applying a newly developed detection scheme using a Single Photon Avalanche Diode (SPAD) and a diode-laser pumped microchip Nd:YAG laser emitting 1 mJ pulses with a pulse width of 1 ns. The reductions in dimension, mass, and power consumption of this instrument are discussed, and the scientific performance is simulated based on first experimental results. The feasibility of accommodating the instrument on the modular TUBiX20 microsatellite platform developed by Technische Universität Berlin is explored and the necessary requirements for attitude and orbit determination and control as well as SWaP budgets are derived

Space-qualified laser system for the BepiColombo Laser Altimeter

The space-qualified design of a miniaturized laser for pulsed operation at a wavelength of 1064 nm and at repetition rates up to 10 Hz is presented. This laser consists of a pair of diode-laser pumped, actively q-switched Nd:YAG rod oscillators hermetically sealed and encapsulated in an environment of dry synthetic air. The system delivers at least 300 million laser pulses with 50 mJ energy and 5 ns pulse width (FWHM). It will be launched in 2017 aboard European Space Agency’s Mercury Planetary Orbiter as part of the BepiColombo Laser Altimeter, which, after a 6-years cruise, will start recording topographic data from orbital altitudes between 400 and 1500 km above Mercury’s surface

The Ganymede Laser Altimeter (GALA) for the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE): Mission, science, and instrumentation of its receiver modules

The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is a science mission led by the European Space Agency, being developed for launch in 2023. The Ganymede Laser Altimeter (GALA) is an instrument onboard JUICE, whose main scientific goals are to understand ice tectonics based on topographic data, the subsurface structure by measuring tidal response, and small-scale roughness and albedo of the surface. In addition, from the perspective of astrobiology, it is imperative to study the subsurface ocean scientifically. The development of GALA has proceeded through an international collaboration between Germany (the lead), Japan, Switzerland, and Spain. Within this framework, the Japanese team (GALA-J) is responsible for developing three receiver modules: the Backend Optics (BEO), the Focal Plane Assembly (FPA), and the Analog Electronics Module (AEM). Like the German team, GALA-J also developed software to simulate the performance of the entire GALA system (performance model). In July 2020, the Proto-Flight Models of BEO, FPA, and AEM were delivered from Japan to Germany. This paper presents an overview of JUICE/GALA and its scientific objectives and describes the instrumentation, mainly focusing on Japan’s contribution

The BepiColombo Laser Altimeter BELA and Tx Verification

BepiColombo is a mission to Mercury. The launch is scheduled for 2014. Onboard will be the BepiColombo Laser Altimeter (BELA) which is being developed and built in collaboration of the University Bern, Switzerland and the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Berlin. The instrument's task is the global mapping of the planetary surface from an orbit in up to 1000 km height above the planet. Therefore the technique of measuring the travel time of light to the surface and back is used. As the speed of light is known very accurately the distance (range) can be calculated very simply. Questions about for example the geological evolution of Mercury or about the tidal movements shall be resolved. Especially the work on the laser transmitter part of the instrument is done by the DLR. This includes design, development and integration of the components as well as verification of the units. Precise alignment of the laser and the receiver telescope are mandatory for the functionality of the instrument. Extensive testing will be performed to assure this in the harsh Mercury environment. A testing setup therefore is designed and built up at DLR site in Berlin Adlershof

Optical Performance Measurements of the BELA EQM and FM Transmitter Laser during AIV

The BepiColombo Laser Altimeter (BELA) onboard the Mercury Planetary Orbiter is Europe’s first built Laser Altimeter for a planetary mission. Its main objectives are global mapping of Mercury’s topography as well as measuring its tidal deformations to learn about the internal structure of this small terrestrial planet [1]. Crucial part of the instrument for this task is the transmitter laser. It must withstand all mission phases till operation in orbit and work within tight parameter margins. To ensure this a dedicated verification program has been performed at DLR Institute for Planetary Research Berlin which is described in the present paper

Europa Jupiter System Mission and Marco Polo Mission: Italian participation in studies of laser altimeters for Jovian moons and asteroids exploration.

CO.RI.S.T.A. (Consortium for Research on Advanced Remote Sensing Systems) is member of international science teams devoted to the studies of laser altimeters to fly on Europa Jupiter System Mission (EJSM) and Marco Polo Mission, currently under study of ESAs Cosmic Vision program as L-class and M-class mission respectively. Both the studies will focus on the assessment of alternative technical approaches that would reduce the mass, size and power requirements. In particular a Single Photon Counting (SPC) device will be studied taking into account the robustness against false detections due to harsh radiation environment in the Jupiter system. Innovative technical aspects which will characterize the studies of laser altimeters in the scenarios of EJSM and MarcoPolo, which will permit us to make major contributions to the science goals of the two missions

BELA transmitter performance and pointing stability verification campaign at DLR-PF

BELA is the first European planetary laser altimeter and shall be launched onboard of ESA's Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) as part of the BepiColombo spacecraft in October 2018. The complete development of the in- strument was done in collaboration with team members in Switzerland, Germany and Spain. The transmitter is also the first space-qualified laser system for a planetary mission built in Europe. Highly important for scientific performance is the transmitter's performance which is specified with demanding values. Thermo-optical pointing stability, alignment, pulse energy, wavelength, pulse profile and length have a direct impact on the signal quality and strength of the instrument and in consequence on the quality of science data. Furthermore for in-orbit operation the detailed knowledge of the transmitter behavior is required for the interpretation of measurement data. Therefore the transmitter, an encapsulated diode pumped pulsed Nd:YAG laser, was extensively tested at facilities at DLR in Berlin-Adlershof under various environmental conditions in all possible representative configurations. This is necessary because thermo-elastic and optical behavior are difficult to predict accurately only theoretically. Furthermore there are temperature dependent effects, e.g. for laser energy, which directly affect science measurements and can only be calibrated on-ground. An optical test bench was designed and set up for this particular task. This work describes the test bench and the measurement procedures. The measure- ment results for the Engineering Qualification Model and Flight Model are presented and discussed as well as lessons learned. The outcome of the tests shows that the BELA FM transmitter performs well with margins and BELA is expected to achieve its scientific goals