project – NASA HESTO

Solar Cruiser: Enabling new vistas for Heliophysics Science

by Steve Christeproject August 2, 2023No Comments

To enable missions to reach novel and otherwise difficult or impossible destinations for observing the Sun, NASA selected the Solar Cruiser Technology Demonstration Mission of Opportunity to develop a 1653 m2 solar sail system for flight demonstration in 2025. Leveraging technology developments to enable new and groundbreaking science is an important Science Mission Directorate goal. Solar …

CHIMERA: A hybrid search coil and fluxgate magnetometer for small spacecraft missions

by Steve Christeproject July 25, 2023No Comments

Magnetometers provide essential magnetic field measurements for solar-terrestrial and space physics research, for space exploration, and for monitoring space weather. Science missions have often needed a search coil magnetometer for high frequencies and a fluxgate magnetometer for the static field and low frequencies. Although one or both instruments have flown on a large percentage of …

Vials of quantum dots glow in different colors under ultraviolet light. The colors of light emitted are determined by the nanoscale size and composition of the crystals in suspension. Image Credit: NASA / Mahmooda Sultana

Spectroscopy through Quantum Dots

by Steve Christeproject July 24, 2023August 30, 2023No Comments

Miniaturizing our measurement devices has become more important over the years as our missions needed an increasing number of spacecraft to enable systems science. Launching many spacecrafts at once, affordably means smaller spacecraft and less room for our instruments. Mahmooda Sultana, a Heliophysics Instrument Development for Science (H-TIDeS) principal investigator, has taken a novel approach …