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Checking NOMAD's LNO pointing

Checking NOMAD's LNO pointing


Date: 26 July 2016
Satellite: ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter
Copyright: ESA/Roscosmos/ExoMars/NOMAD/BISA/IAA/INAF/OU

This figure shows the result of tests with the Limb, Nadir and Occultation (LNO) channel of NOMAD, carried out during the mid-course checkout in June 2016.

At the time, the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter was performing line scans to allow the NOMAD team to check the pointing of their instrument. The spacecraft was oriented so that the fields of view of the three spectrometers – the LNO, the Solar Occultation (SO) channel, and the Ultraviolet and Visible (UVIS) channel – scanned a region around and including the Sun to build up an image of the intensity of the signal. From this, the team could pinpoint the location of the Sun and use this to check the pointing direction of each spectrometer.

The highest signal is observed in the centre of the scan, which indicates that the team's calculation of where the instrument is pointing, based on data obtained during the Near-Earth Commissioning tests, is correct.

NOMAD is one of four science instruments on the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter, launched in March 2016 and due to arrive at Mars in October.

Last Update: 1 September 2019
29-Mar-2024 13:56 UT

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