flyby Archives - OZ9AEC Website

The required precision for the Phobos experiment

February 19, 2010 by Alexandru Csete

Thanks to Hannes DG1GGH of ESOC, we now have an idea what kind of precision is required for the Phobos flyby experiment. The answer is in the comments to this very informative and interesting post on the Mars Express blog from today. According to Hannes, they are expecting the influence of Phobos to cause a … Read more

No Mars Express experiment this time

August 23, 2016February 18, 2010 by Alexandru Csete

It was a difficult decision to accept, but the Mars Express experiment with the USRP and GNU Radio is not going to happen this time! It’s a shame because the link budget looked quite promising. An optimistic estimate gives almost 20 dB signal to noise ratio, which is more than we need, so the problem … Read more

Aiming for planetary science with GNU Radio and the USRP

February 17, 2010 by Alexandru Csete

Thanks to the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Mars Express mission, we might have an opportunity just around the corner for doing big science with GNU Radio and the USRP!

On March 3, 2010, Mars Express will visit the Martian moon Phobos by performing a close flyby. According to ESA, the ESOC ops team is working with a number of possible scenarios, including one that would take the spacecraft to just 50 km above Phobos. At that distance the orbit of the spacecraft is expected to be influenced by the gravitational pull of Phobos. I knew this already for about a week when I first read it on the Mars Express Blog but it was first today that I realized the opportunities this event offers.