MICROSCOPE Mission scenario, ground segment and data processing

Abstract

Testing the Weak Equivalence Principle (WEP) to a precision of $10^{-15}$ requires a quantity of data that give enough confidence on the final result: ideally, the longer the measurement the better the rejection of thestatistical noise. The science sessions had a duration of 120 orbits maximum and were regularly repeated and spaced out to accommodate operational constraints but also in order to repeat the experiment in different conditions and to allow time to calibrate the instrument. Several science sessions were performed over the 2.5 year duration of the experiment. This paper aims to describe how the data have been produced on the basis of a mission scenario and a data flow process, driven by a tradeoff between the science objectives and the operational constraints. The mission was led by the Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES) which provided the satellite, the launch and the ground operations. The ground segment was distributed between CNES and Office National d'Etudes et de Recherches Aérospatiales (ONERA). CNES provided the raw data through the Centre d'Expertise de Compensation de Traînée (CECT: Drag-free expertise centre). The science was led by the Observatoire de la Côte d{'}Azur (OCA) and ONERA was in charge of the data process. The latter also provided the instrument and the Science Mission Centre of MICROSCOPE (CMSM).

To be released in special MICROSCOPE edition of CQG

References in corpus (10)

• The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment
• Test of the Equivalence Principle Using a Rotating Torsion Balance
• Lunar Laser Ranging Tests of the Equivalence Principle
• Space test of the Equivalence Principle: first results of the MICROSCOPE mission
• Result of the MICROSCOPE Weak Equivalence Principle test
• Gaussian regression and power spectral density estimation with missing data: The MICROSCOPE space mission as a case study
• MICROSCOPE instrument in-flight characterization
• MICROSCOPE mission analysis, requirements and expected performance
• MICROSCOPE mission: Data analysis principle
• MICROSCOPE: systematic errors

Cited by in corpus (8)

• MICROSCOPE mission: final results of the test of the Equivalence Principle
• Result of the MICROSCOPE Weak Equivalence Principle test
• MICROSCOPE instrument in-flight characterization
• MICROSCOPE mission analysis, requirements and expected performance
• MICROSCOPE mission: Data analysis principle
• MICROSCOPE: systematic errors
• Violation of the equivalence principle induced by oscillating rest mass and transition frequency, and its detection in atom interferometers
• On the first test of the Weak Equivalence Principle in low Earth orbit