Dust
Experiment
The
Ulysses dust experiment is intended to provide direct observations
of dust grains with masses between 10**-16 g and 10**-6
g in interplanetary space, to investigate their physical
and dynamical properties as functions of heliocentric distance
and ecliptic latitude. Of special interest is the question
of what portion is provided by comets, asteroids and interstellar
particles. The investigation is performed with an instrument
that measures the mass, speed, flight direction and electric
charge of individual dust particles. It is a multicoincidence
detector with a mass sensitivity 10**6 times higher than
that of previous in situ experiments which measured dust
in the outer solar system. The instrument weighs 3.8 kg,
consumes 2.2 W, and has a normal data transmission rate
of 8 bits/s in nominal spacecraft tracking mode. On 27th
October 1990 the instrument was switched on. The instrument
was configured to flight conditions and science data collection
started immediately. In the period to 13th January 1991
at least 44 dust impacts have been recorded. Flux values
are given covering the heliocentric distance range from
1.04 to 1.7 AU.
(Abstract
from: E. Gruen et al., Astron. Astrophys. Suppl. Ser. 92,
411-423, 1992)
Ulysses
Dust Page
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Team Home Page
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