Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

Palomar · 2004-01-27 12:35:29

[=http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=13513]Read Me

*Joint NASA/ESA. This mission isn't getting much publicity, at least not on "this side of the pond."

Besides the Mars goings-on we have this: "The spacecraft and all scientific instruments are in good health. Preparations are underway for the Jupiter Distant Encounter campaign that will take place between the end of January and mid-March 2004."

-and-

"Closest approach to Jupiter occurs on 4 February, at a distance of 1684 Jupiter radii (~0.8 AU or 120 million km) from the planet."

Terrific! Something else to keep tabs on.

--Cindy

Palomar · 2004-06-05 21:18:59

*I wish now I'd have placed this in "Unmanned Probes," despite the seeming scanty attention it gets in space-related news...and it's been "out there" a while! Go figure... ???

Here's some http://www.esa.int/export/esaSC/120395_ … background information.

Relative to the Sun: "In 1990, Ulysses was launched by a NASA Space Shuttle on an unprecedented journey of discovery. The gravity of the planet Jupiter deflected it into an orbit taking it over the Sun’s poles. With an array of sophisticated sensors for gauging the invisible winds, atoms, dust grains, and magnetic fields that permeate space around the Sun, Ulysses passed 300 million kilometres above the Sun's southern and northern poles, regions never studied before.

Ulysses has explored the solar wind from all angles, producing the first three-dimensional picture of the heliosphere. It found that the wind from the cooler regions close to the Sun's poles fans out to fill two thirds of the heliosphere, and blows at a uniform speed of 750 kilometres per second, much faster than the 350 kilometres per second wind that emerges from the Sun’s equatorial zone."

-*-

Ah...I know how I missed this little nugget; they had it tucked away in a crowded sidebar. :-\

http://www.jupitertoday.com/news/viewpr … 97]Ulysses sweeps up dust from Jupiter. Streams of dust particles flowing from Jupiter, apparently with the fineness of smoke, which originate "in the fiery volcanoes of Jupiter's moon Io." These particles carry an electrical charge. :-\ Cool.

More: "Another unusual feature is that the streams occur with a period of about 28 days. This suggests that they are influenced by solar wind streams that rotate with the Sun."

--Cindy

P.S. If Josh or Adrian happen to read this, would you kindly move this thread to the Unmanned Probes folder please?

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2004-06-22 06:35:44

I really liked that mission, thought it was a great idea and it brought back great information about our Sun, good tracking and images of the Solar winds

http://sci.esa.int/science-e-media/img/ … _12398.gif

And from the gathered information the people in EU and the USA were able to make good iamges and models of details like the solar corona, solar wind, and spiral magnetic field

http://sci.esa.int/science-e-media/img/ … _24681.jpg

Ulysses was a very good idea for a probe and it had conducted the first-ever survey of the Sun's environment in space from the equator to the poles and first direct measurements of interstellar helium atoms going into energy and it also had made the newest discovery of energetic particle "reservoirs" surrounding the Sun, the discovery of interstellar dust in the darkness of our solar system, the probe is still going on bring back more information

here is some news on it

Deep space is cold. Very cold. That's a problem--especially if you're flying in an old spaceship. And your power supplies are waning. And the fuel lines could freeze at any moment. Oh, and by the way, you've got to keep flying for thirteen more years.
It sounds like a science fiction thriller, but this is really happening to the NASA/European Space Agency spacecraft Ulysses.
Ulysses was launched in 1990 on a five-year mission to study the sun. The craft gathered new data about the speed and direction of the solar wind. It discovered the 3D shape of the sun's magnetic field. It recorded solar flares on the sun, and super-solar flares from distant neutron stars. Ulysses even flew through the tail of comet Hyakutake, an unexpected encounter that delighted astronomers.
The mission was supposed to end in 1995, but Ulysses was too successful to quit. NASA and the ESA have granted three extensions, most recently in Feb. 2004. Ulysses is scheduled to keep going until 2008, thirteen years longer than originally planned.
Ulysses' extended mission, as before, is to study the sun. But at the moment Ulysses is far from our star. It's having an encounter with Jupiter, studying the giant planet and its magnetic field. Sunlight out there is 25 times less intense than what we experience on Earth, and Ulysses is getting perilously cold.
Back in the 1980's, when Ulysses was still on Earth and being assembled, mission planners knew that the spacecraft would have to endure some low temperatures. So they put dozens of heaters onboard, all powered by a Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator, or "RTG." These heaters have kept Ulysses comfortably warm.
But there's a problem: the RTG is fading.
"The power output of the RTG has been dropping since the spacecraft was launched," says Nigel Angold, the Ulysses ESA Spacecraft Operations Manager at JPL. RTG power naturally fades as its radioactive source decays. That's as expected. What planners didn't expect was 13 years of extra operations.
"When Ulysses was launched in 1990 the RTG produced 285 watts. Now it's down to 207 watts--barely enough power to run the science instruments and the heaters at the same time," notes Angold.
Inside Ulysses the temperature varies from place to place. "Many of the science instruments are already below freezing (0 C)," says Ulysses thermal engineer Fernando Castro. "That's OK, because they can operate at low temperature." But the fuel lines are another matter. They're hovering about 3 degrees above zero, "and if they freeze we're in trouble."
Fuel lines are critical to the mission. They deliver hydrazine propellant to the ship's eight thrusters. Every week or so, ground controllers fire the thrusters to keep Ulysses' radio antenna pointing toward Earth. The thrusters won't work if the hydrazine freezes. No thrusters means no communication. The mission would be lost.
About eight meters of fuel line snake through the spaceship. Every twist and turn is a possible cold spot, a place where the hydrazine can begin to solidify. "If the hydrazine freezes anywhere, I don't know if we can safely thaw it again," worries Castro. When hydrazine thaws, it expands, possibly enough to rupture the fuel lines. Ulysses' propellant would fizzle uselessly into space.
The temperature at any given point along the fuel lines is bewilderingly sensitive to what's going on elsewhere in the spacecraft. Turning on a scientific instrument "here" might cause a chill "over there," because it takes power away from one of the heaters. Firing a thruster, playing back or recording data: almost anything could upset Ulysses' delicate thermal balance.
Even the simple act of sending the spacecraft a message can cause problems. Systems engineer Andy McGarry recalls, "last month we were sending some new commands to Ulysses when the temperature began to drop, as much as 0.8 degrees C near the fuel lines. We were less than a degree from the freezing point of hydrazine--too close for comfort."
Engineers quickly figured out the problem. "All of Ulysses' science instruments had been activated to study Jupiter," explains McGarry, "and this was straining the RTG to its limit." Ulysses would have trouble supporting even one more device. But when a signal arrived from Earth, another device did turn on, automatically: the decoder, which translates radio signals into a stream of binary ones and zeros understood by Ulysses' computers. "The decoder was stealing power from the heaters."
Since then ground controllers have learned to keep their transmissions to Ulysses brief, so the temperature can't fall very far.
Ulysses is about to turn away from Jupiter and head back to the sun. Eventually solar heating will keep the hydrazine warm, and onboard heaters can be turned off, "but that won't happen until 2007," says Angold. Meanwhile, engineers at JPL keep a constant watch on the spacecraft.
Mission scientist Steve Suess at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center believes it's worth the effort. "The extended mission gives us a chance to learn a lot more about the sun." Of special interest is the Solar Minimum. Solar activity waxes and wanes every 11 years, he explains. Ulysses studied the sun's quiet phase, Solar Minimum, between 1994 and 1995. Now Ulysses gets to do it again. "The next Solar Minimum is due around 2006," says Suess, "but it won't be the same as before." In 2001 the sun's magnetic field flipped. The north pole shifted south, and vice versa. Magnetically speaking, the sun is now upside down. How will that affect Solar Minimum?
Perhaps Ulysses will find out … if it doesn't freeze to death first.

let's hope it can stay alive

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2004-07-18 16:38:20

I was very happy when NASA launched this mission and the joint ESA/NASA mission has done very well for itself.
The ESA Ulysses archive is accessible via the World Wide Web at URL: http://helio.estec.esa.nl/ulysses/archi … es/archive

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2005-03-10 11:50:52

some recent bad news on this one, NASA officials told seven mission managers (Voyager, Ulysses, Polar, Wind, Geotail, FAST (Fast Auroral SnapshoT) and TRACE (Transition Region and Coronal Explorer)) that there is now no money to keep their projects operating
lucky for NASA that Ulysses is a joint mission with Europeans so perhaps those other ESA people might be able to bail NASA out with their Euros, but if NASA continues to do bad management and run-up debts I fear it will cause its own failures

:down:

perhaps the USA will move away from doing robotic spacecraft and unmanned landers, they will then outsource all these missions to other nations and keep their manned missions at home with astronauts and shuttle ?? How else could one explain this ?
but outsourcing unmanned craft and robotic-designs will be giving the science away to other nations and it could cost the US in technology, space science and cost the scientific spin-offs and tech for the economy

Europeans don't seem to have strong leadership and big goals, but when they do Space missions they are very smart with their smaller budgets and clever with science benefits from missions
I doubt Europe will allow Ulysses to die, like NASA is trying to do to the mission

Palomar · 2005-03-10 12:11:53

some recent bad news on this one, NASA officials told seven mission managers (Voyager, Ulysses, Polar, Wind, Geotail, FAST (Fast Auroral SnapshoT) and TRACE (Transition Region and Coronal Explorer)) that there is now no money to keep their projects operating
lucky for NASA that Ulysses is a joint mission with Europeans so perhaps those other ESA people might be able to bail NASA out with their Euros, but if NASA continues to do bad management and run-up debts I fear it will cause its own failures
:down:
perhaps the USA will move away from doing robotic spacecraft and unmanned landers, they will then outsource all these missions to other nations and keep their manned missions at home with astronauts and shuttle ?? How else could one explain this ?
but outsourcing unmanned craft and robotic-designs will be giving the science away to other nations and it could cost the US in technology, space science and cost the scientific spin-offs and tech for the economy
Europeans don't seem to have strong leadership and big goals, but when they do Space missions they are very smart with their smaller budgets and clever with science benefits from missions
I doubt Europe will allow Ulysses to die, like NASA is trying to do to the mission

*I certainly do hope ESA pulls we science-lovers through on this one. What is NASA thinking?? :bars2:

There aren't many reports about Ulysses, at least that I've seen (and I scour a lot of astronomy/space exploration web sites nearly daily).

But hopefully it'll keep going and won't get the ax prior to its original termination date. And the other missions too, of course.

--Cindy

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2005-08-05 07:47:11

some of the archive status reports by European space page

Ulysses has played a major role in the study of so-called soft gamma repeaters, or 'magnetars'. These are neutron stars in our own galaxy, which are thought to possess magnetic fields with strengths of >10 ^ 14 G.

Ulysses found an entirely different heliosphere at solar maximum compared with that observed near solar minimum. At solar minimum, the heliosphere was dominated by the fast wind from the southern and northern polar coronal holes. In contrast, during solar maximum, the large polar coronal holes had disappeared, and the heliosphere appeared much more symmetric. The solar wind flows measured throughout the south polar pass, and much of the rapid transit from south to north, showed no systematic dependence on latitude. The wind itself was generally slower and much more variable than at solar minimum at all latitudes.

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object … 930]report

Measurements by the Ulysses GAS experiment of interstellar helium atoms have provided the most accurate determination of the velocity of the Sun with respect to the local interstellar medium (26 km/s) and of the temperature of the local interstellar gas (6500 K).

The last report ends with -
situation concerning the budget for NASA's contribution to the mission remains a concern.

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2005-10-06 21:47:47

Ulysses, fifteen years and going strong
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMTNC5Y3EE_index_0.html
6 October 2005
Fifteen years after its launch, the grand ESA/NASA Ulysses space mission is still going strong, orbiting the Sun and continuing to tell exciting stories about our nearest star.

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2006-03-06 20:19:36

Ulysses Status Report - February 2006
15 Feb 2006 13:22
Mission Status
All spacecraft subsystems are operating nominally. On 1 February 2006, Ulysses will be at a radial distance of 4.35 AU from the Sun, and heliographic latitude 40° south of the solar equator.
http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object … ctid=38804
As reported earlier, Ulysses was one of the missions reviewed by NASA's Sun-Solar System Connections Senior Review panel at its meeting on 14-15 November. The formal recommendations from the Review are expected to be made known early in this year.

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2007-08-18 13:09:44

Scientists from the Ulysses mission have proven that sounds generated deep inside the Sun cause the Earth to shake and vibrate in sympathy. They have found that Earth’s magnetic field, atmosphere and terrestrial systems, all take part in this cosmic sing-along.

http://www.esa.int/esaSC/SEMJJYUL05F_index_0.html

noosfractal · 2007-08-18 17:58:51

http://www.esa.int/esaSC/SEMJJYUL05F_index_0.html

...
Thomson believes that the key to the problem is magnetism. He suggests that the g-mode vibrations are picked up by the magnetic field at the Sun’s surface. Part of this magnetic field is then carried away from Sun into interplanetary space by solar wind, where it can be detected by space probes like Ulysses.

The magnetic field of the solar wind in turn interacts with the Earth’s magnetic field and causes it to vibrate in sympathy, retaining the characteristic g-mode signals. The motions of the geomagnetic field then couple into the solid Earth to produce small, but easily detectable, responses
...

[ This is pretty cool. I guess the geomagnetic field couples with the solid Earth via the core? ]

Yang Liwei Rocket · 2007-10-05 17:26:22

Chance encounter with comet nets surprising results

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=23680

EuroLauncher · 2007-11-15 08:36:47

Meeting in Paris on 12-13 November, ESA's Science Programme Committee unanimously approved a proposal to continue operating the highly successful Ulysses spacecraft until March 2009. This latest extension, for a period of 12 months, is the fourth in the history of the joint ESA-NASA mission.

http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object … ctid=41769

cIclops · 2008-01-21 02:55:11

Flyby of the Sun's North Pole - 14 Jan 2008

Consider it a case of exquisite timing. Just last week, solar physicists announced the beginning of a new solar cycle and now, Jan. 14th, the Ulysses spacecraft is flying over a key region of solar activity--the sun's North Pole.
"This is a wonderful opportunity to examine the sun's North Pole at the onset of a new solar cycle," says Arik Posner, NASA Ulysses program scientist. "We've never done this before."

cIclops · 2008-03-03 04:56:50

International Solar Mission to End Following Stellar Performance - 22 Feb 2008

WASHINGTON - The joint NASA and European Space Agency Ulysses mission to study the sun and its influence on surrounding space is likely to cease operations in the next few months. The venerable spacecraft, which has lasted more than 17 years or almost four times its expected mission lifetime, is succumbing to the harsh environment of space.
Ulysses was the first mission to survey the space environment above and below the poles of the sun. The reams of data Ulysses returned have forever changed the way scientists view our star and its effects.
"I remember when we got those first pictures of Ulysses floating out of the space shuttle Discovery's payload bay back in October of 1990 and thinking we had a great five years ahead of us," said Ed Massey, Ulysses project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "I never dared think that we would be receiving invaluable science data on a near continuous basis for more than 17 years. Ulysses has set the bar on solar science data collection quite high."
Science findings and discoveries from the mission were numerous and unprecedented. Examples include taking the first direct measurements of interstellar dust particles and interstellar helium atoms in the solar system and the discovery that the magnetic field leaving the sun is balanced across latitudes.
"The data and science output of this mission truly deserves to be named after the legendary explorer in Greek mythology," said Arik Posner, Ulysses program scientist, NASA Headquarters, Washington. "My compliments go out to the international team of scientists and engineers who built a spaceship and instrument payload that is highly sensitive, yet durable enough that it withstood the most extreme conditions in the solar system, including a polar passage of the giant planet Jupiter."
Since its Jupiter flyby in 1992, Ulysses has been in a six-year orbit around the sun. Its long path through space carries it out to Jupiter's orbit and back. The farther it ventures from the sun, the colder the spacecraft becomes. If it drops to 36 degrees Fahrenheit, the spacecraft's hydrazine fuel will freeze. This has not been a problem in the past because Ulysses carries heaters to maintain a workable onboard temperature.
The spacecraft is powered by the decay of a radioactive isotope. Over its 17-plus years, the power has been steadily dropping. The spacecraft no longer can run all of its communications, heating and scientific equipment simultaneously. "We expect certain parts of the spacecraft to reach 36 degrees pretty soon," said Richard Marsden, ESA project scientist and mission manager. This temperature drop will block the fuel pipes, making the spacecraft impossible to maneuver.
The NASA/ESA project team approved a plan to temporarily shut off the main spacecraft's X- band transmitter. This would release 60 watts of power, which could be channeled to the science instruments and the heater. The team planned to turn the transmitter back on when data was to be transmitted back to Earth. This would have made it possible to run Ulysses for up to another two years.
Unfortunately, during the first test of this approach in January, the power supply to the radio transmitter failed to turn back on. Engineers believe the fault can be traced to the transmitter's power supply, meaning that the extra energy they hoped to gain cannot be routed to the heater and science instruments. "The decision to switch the transmitter off was not taken lightly. It was the only way to continue the science mission," Marsden said.
After many attempts, the Ulysses project team now considers it highly unlikely that the X-band transmitter will be recovered. As a result, the spacecraft has lost its ability to send large quantities of scientific data back to Earth and is facing the gradual freezing of its fuel lines. The team plans to continue operating the spacecraft in its reduced capacity, using the alternate S-band transmitter, for as long as they can over the next few weeks.
"We will squeeze the very last drops of science out of it that we can," Marsden said. "Ulysses is a terrific old workhorse. It has produced great science and lasted much longer than we ever thought it would."
The Ulysses spacecraft was built by Dornier Systems of Germany for ESA. NASA provided the launch and the upper stage boosters. The U.S. Department of Energy, Washington, supplied the generator that powers the spacecraft; science instruments were provided by both U.S. and European investigators. The spacecraft is operated from JPL by a joint NASA/ESA team and has employed NASA's Deep Space Network for communications.

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#1 2004-01-27 12:35:29

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#2 2004-06-05 21:18:59

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#3 2004-06-22 06:35:44

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#4 2004-07-18 16:38:20

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#5 2005-03-10 11:50:52

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#6 2005-03-10 12:11:53

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#7 2005-08-05 07:47:11

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#8 2005-10-06 21:47:47

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#9 2006-03-06 20:19:36

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#10 2007-08-18 13:09:44

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#11 2007-08-18 17:58:51

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#12 2007-10-05 17:26:22

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#13 2007-11-15 08:36:47

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#14 2008-01-21 02:55:11

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

#15 2008-03-03 04:56:50

Re: Ulysses - ESA/NASA solar polar orbiter via Jupiter

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