The Solar Wind Around Pluto (SWAP) Instrument Aboard New Horizons

Abstract

The Solar Wind Around Pluto (SWAP) instrument on New Horizons will measure the interaction between the solar wind and ions created by atmospheric loss from Pluto. These measurements provide a characterization of the total loss rate and allow us to examine the complex plasma interactions at Pluto for the first time. Constrained to fit within minimal resources, SWAP is optimized to make plasma-ion measurements at all rotation angles as the New Horizons spacecraft scans to image Pluto and Charon during the flyby. In order to meet these unique requirements, we combined a cylindrically symmetric retarding potential analyzer (RPA) with small deflectors, a top-hat analyzer, and a redundant/coincidence detection scheme. This configuration allows for highly sensitive measurements and a controllable energy passband at all scan angles of the spacecraft.

78 pages, 42 figures, 7 tables; To appear in a special volume of Space Science Reviews on the New Horizons mission

Cited by in corpus (26)

• The New Horizons Pluto Kuiper belt Mission: An Overview with Historical Context
• Structure and Composition of Pluto's atmosphere from the New Horizons Solar Ultraviolet Occultation
• The Pluto System After New Horizons
• Interstellar Pickup Ion Observations to 38 AU
• New Horizons: Anticipated Scientific Investigations at the Pluto System
• The New Horizons Spacecraft
• Plutos interaction with its space environment: Solar Wind, Energetic Particles & Dust
• The Pluto Energetic Particle Spectrometer Science Investigation (PEPSSI) on the New Horizons Mission
• New Horizons Solar Wind Around Pluto (SWAP) Observations of the Solar Wind From 11-33 AU
• In Situ Observations of Preferential Pickup Ion Heating at an Interplanetary Shock
• Interstellar Neutral Gas Species And Their Pickup Ions Inside The Heliospheric Termination Shock. Ionization Rates For H, O, Ne, And He
• Overview of the New Horizons Science Payload
• The New Horizons Kuiper Belt Extended Mission
• Modeling the Solar Wind at the Ulysses, Voyager, and New Horizons Spacecraft
• Solar wind dynamics around a comet - A 2D semi-analytical kinetic model
• Heliosheath Properties Measured from a Voyager 2 to Voyager 1 Transient
• The Puzzling Detection of X-rays From Pluto by Chandra
• The Impact of Turbulent Solar Wind Fluctuations on Solar Orbiter Plasma Proton Measurements
• Solar Wind at 33 AU: Setting Bounds on the Pluto Interaction for New Horizons
• Angular Scattering in Charge Exchange: Issues and Implications for Secondary Interstellar Hydrogen
• Deriving the bulk properties of solar wind electrons observed by Solar Orbiter: A preliminary study of electron plasma thermodynamics
• Interstellar Neutral Hydrogen in the Heliosphere: New Horizons Observations in the Context of Models
• Turbulence Driving by Interstellar Pickup Ions in the Outer Solar Wind
• Synergies between interstellar dust and heliospheric science with an Interstellar Probe
• Design and Optimization of a High-Time-Resolution Magnetic Plasma Analyzer (MPA)
• The Search for MeV Electrons 2-45 AU from the Sun with the Alice Instrument Microchannel Plate Detector Aboard New Horizons