One of the world’s most sophisticated
satellite tracking stations is nearing inauguration in Malargüe, Argentina,
1000 km west of Buenos Aires. The new station will ensure reliable
communications with missions voyaging hundreds of millions of kilometres into
our Solar System.
ESA’s new tracking station, near the town of
Malargüe in Mendoza province, joins two existing stations in Spain and Australia
to provide global coverage for the Agency’s deep-space missions.
Deep Space Antenna 3 – or DSA 3 – will send
commands, receive data and perform radiometric measurements with missions such
as Mars Express, Venus Express, Rosetta, Herschel, Planck, Gaia, BepiColombo,
ExoMars, Solar Orbiter and Juice.
With major construction complete, teams are
preparing DSA 3 for hand-over to operations, formal inauguration late this year
and entry in routine service early in 2013.
First test signals received from Mars Express
The first test signals were received in June
2012 from Mars Express, over a distance of about 193 million km, proving that
the station’s technology is ready for duty.
“Initial in-service testing with the Malargüe
station shows excellent results.” “Our initial in-service testing with the
Malargüe station shows excellent results,” says Roberto Maddè, ESA’s project
manager for DSA 3 construction.
“We have been able to quickly and accurately
acquire signals from ESA and NASA spacecraft, and our station is performing
better than specified.” Maddè says part of the reason for the excellent
performance is the improved ultra-low-temperature amplifiers installed at the
station, and also the fact that it’s located at 1500m altitude in the clear Argentinian
desert air.
Completing a trio of deep space stations
DSA 3 joins the Agency’s existing DSA 1 and
DSA 2 stations in New Norcia, Western Australia, and Cebreros, Spain,
respectively, to provide the third link in a global network that is controlled
remotely by engineers at ESOC, ESA’s European Space Operations Centre, and
Germany.
Lifting the huge antenna dish into place
Like the New Norcia and Cebreros stations,
Malargüe is equipped with a giant 35 m-diameter dish antenna and
super-sophisticated cryogenically cooled low-noise amplifiers to detect faint
signals and operate at various power levels – up to 20 kW – to transmit
commands.
The tracking capability of all three ESA deep
space stations also provides support to partner agencies such as NASA and
Japan’s JAXA, who likewise make their tracking networks available to ESA
missions, helping to boost science data return for all.
The three are also equipped for radio
science, which studies how matter, such as planetary atmospheres, affects the radio
waves as they pass through. This can provide important information on the
composition for the atmospheres around Mars, Venus or the Sun, for example.
Using galaxies to pin point satellite
locations
The ESA stations can use the highly accurate
‘delta – Differential One-Way Ranging’ (delta-DOR) technique for very accurate
locating and navigation of spacecraft in our Solar System. This sophisticated
method uses quasi-stellar radio sources – very energetic and distant active
galaxy centres – as calibration points to fix the location of a spacecraft to
within a few metres.
Boosting tracking capacity to support future
missions
“The commissioning of this station into ESA´s
deep-space network allows us to serve the most demanding scientific missions of
ESA and provide the required communication capacity for transferring large
volumes of scientific data from the sophisticated instruments onboard ESA
spacecraft,” says Manfred Lugert, ESA’s Head of Ground Facilities Operations.
“The design, development and construction of
this station marks a huge success for ESA and our
industrial partners,” says Juan Miro, ESA’s Head of Ground Systems Engineering.
“It helps to confirm ESA as Europe’s top space research and development
organisation.”
