Development of the active space hydrogen maser for the ACES space experiment of ESA

Author

Berthoud, P. ; Goujon, D. ; Gritti, D. ; Jornod, A. ; Weber, C. ; Dürrenberger, M. ; Schweda, H. ; Roulet, M. ; Thieme, B. ; Baister, G.

Author_Institution

Obs. de Neuchatel, Neuchatel, Switzerland

fYear

2006

fDate

27-30 March 2006

Firstpage

379

Lastpage

383

Abstract

In the frame of the scientific mission Atomic Clock Ensemble in Space (ACES), Observatoire de Neuchâtel (ON), Switzerland, is developing the Space Hydrogen Maser (SHM) in collaboration with Contraves Space AG (CSAG), Switzerland. The Physics Package of the Engineering Model is assembled and performs as specified: for nominal operational parameters, the long-term frequency stability is 1×10^-15 @ 10´000s, thanks to the Automatic Cavity Tuning (ACT). The ACT concept based on a pulsed interrogation scheme of the cavity has been developed and demonstrated with a laboratory demonstrator at ON. The space compatible electronics package is being assembled by CSAG and preliminary functional tests are satisfactory.

Keywords

aerospace instrumentation; atomic clocks; electronics packaging; frequency stability; hydrogen; ACES space experiment; ACT; CSAG; ESA; H; ON; Observatoire de Neuchâtel; Physics Package of the Engineering Model; SHM; Switzerland; atomic clock ensemble in space; automatic cavity tuning; cavity pulsed interrogation scheme; contraves space AG; long-term frequency stability; scientific mission; space compatible electronics packaging; space hydrogen maser; Aerospace electronics; Atomic clocks; Cavity resonators; Hydrogen; Magnetic shielding; Masers;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Frequency and Time Forum (EFTF), 2006 20th European

Conference_Location

Braunschweig

Print_ISBN

978-1-4673-2642-1

Type

conf

Filename

6231010