The European Space Agency (ESA) has received a remarkable addition to its Hera mission – a mini-radar designed to fit on the Juventas CubeSat. This small radar is set to accomplish an unprecedented feat: capture images of an asteroid's interior. The primary target is Asteroid Dimorphos, an asteroid roughly the size of the Great Pyramid, whose orbit was significantly altered by NASA's DART spacecraft last year, when a spacecraft was crashed into it.
Alain Herique, the lead investigator from the Institut de Planetologie et d'Astrophysique de Grenoble (IPAG) at the University Grenoble Alpes, expressed his enthusiasm about the delivery, marking a crucial milestone in the project. Although the radar has been handed over, the team's work is far from finished. The next steps involve integrating the radar with the CubeSat and ensuring its optimal performance in space.
Space beyond Earth's orbit is filled with high-energy particles that can damage electronics. Due to this challenge, the mini-radar's components had to undergo rigorous radiation testing before being deemed space-ready. The radar, known as JuRa, is a compact instrument developed by a Luxembourg-based company called EmTroniX, known for its innovative designs in "New Space" missions.
JuRa's radar design is based on a similar radar flown on ESA's Rosetta mission, which explored the depths of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. What sets JuRa apart is its adaptability to the specific circumstances of Dimorphos. Juventas CubeSat will be orbiting the asteroid at a slow pace, allowing JuRa to transmit signals repeatedly to enhance the quality of the data it gathers.
Scheduled for launch in 2024, the Juventas CubeSat will embark on the Hera mission to the Didymos binary asteroid
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