ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 1 Monthly Status Report Report due 6/25/01 Schedule statused as of May 11, 2001

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 2 Project Status Summary Technical Apr May Jun Detailed Description: (for items identified as yellow or red) Programmatic Apr May Jun Schedule Apr May Jun Resources Apr May Jun During calibration of the ELS flight unit at MSSL, it was found that the unit could not count at a fast enough rate. The unit was returned to SwRI this month for trouble shooting. Software activities continue to be on track. The amplifier train has been shown to work at much greater than spec. Trouble shooting continues. Latest project photos and videos are available on Aspera-3 web site.photosvideos

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 3 Problem and Concern Summary P=Problem C=Concern R=Resolved

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 4 Accomplishments of the Last Month -ELS Began flight unit calibration. Problems seen in flight unit not being able to detect electrons at fast enough rate. Delivered flight spare to MSSL and swapped flight spare amplifier board with flight unit (i.e. put flight spare amplifier board into flight unit). Tested “new” flight configuration – same count rate problem. Returned the flight spare unit (with flight amplifier board) to SwRI for troubleshooting. Amplifiers verified to work at greater than 1 MHz (much higher than needed). Installed flight spare into characterization chamber sans housing for filament count rate test to try to reproduce problem at MSSL.

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 5 Accomplishments of the Last Month - IMA Supported IRF assembly and test of IMA and IMA detector subassembly via telcon.

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 6 Accomplishments of the Last Month - Data Reduction Software Released APAF Software Development Plan (SDP), V1.3 June 7, 2001 Continued Dialog with Staff of PDS PPI Node and ESTEC Staff for ASPERA-3 Data Archiving Plans Attended Mars Express (MEX) Data Archiving Working Group (DAWG) Meeting June 20-22, 2001 at ESTEC –Attended ASPERA-3 Data Archiving Splinter Meetings June 20-21, 2001 Continued Packet Definitions for NPI Began Packet Definition Review for IMA Continued Providing Technical Assistance for EPO Web Information Continued Defining and Implementing IDFS Web Tools Held monthly ASPERA-3 Software Status Meeting (June 28, 2001)

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 7 Planned Activities for the Next Month - ELS Continue troubleshooting.

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 8 Planned Activities for the Next Month - IMA Support IRF in the assembly and test of the IMA flight model via telcon.

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 9 Planned Activities for the Next Month - Data Reduction Software Tasks Begin Updates to APAF Project Data Management Plan (PDMP) for Version 1.2 Begin Updates to APAF Data System Interface Document (DSID) for Version 1.1 Continue Dialog with Staff of PDS PPI Node and ESTEC Staff for Updates to the APAF PDMP and DSID Continue Packet Definitions for NPI and IMA Continue Providing Technical Assistance for EPO Web Information Continue Defining and Implementing IDFS Web Tools

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 10 Problem and Concern Status (1 of 2) Funding for ELS board fix: This activity is no longer a concern. We received our last periods cost sheets and have underrun our estimate on this amplifier board fix. The amount of forward funding should be adequate for this activity.

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 11 Problem and Concern Status (2 of 2) Low count rate in ELS: The flight ELS instrument was delivered to MSSL last month and calibration was started. During the calibration, the instrument seemed to saturate at ~500 counts/sec per channel. This is significantly lower than expected and required. This was not conclusively seen during the characterization at SwRI because the SwRI beam is orders of magnitude weaker in flux than the MSSL beam. We then delivered the flight spare to MSSL and swapped the flight spare amplifier board with the flight amplifier board to try to determine if the problem was related to the individual amplifiers. The problem remained. The flight spare has since been returned to SwRI for trouble shooting. We have stimulated the amplifiers with a pulser and have seen count rates in excess of 1 MHz thus eliminating the amplifiers from the problem. We have pumped down the unit and have set up to use a filament source which is capable of very high count rates and collimator to illuminate a single anode to try to reproduce the problem at MSSL. The two current theories are 1) that the MCPs being used are not capable of producing higher count rates, and 2) that the anode resistors are improperly sized thus “starving” the MCPs for current. Once we reproduce the problem, we will replace the resistors (simple fix) and see if that corrects the a problem. If not, the MCPs will likely need to be replaced

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 12 Schedule Summary ELS: ELS was delivered to MSSL / IRF on May 15. Problems surfaced during calibration and are currently being worked. IRF is very aware of our activities and schedule and have agreed to our current plan. Software: Software activities continue to be on schedule. The full-up schedule is available on the ASPERA-3 Web site.

ASPERA-3 June 25, 01 Monthly Status Report ASPERA Monthly Status ReportMonthly 6_25/ Page 13 ASPERA-3 PHASE B/C/D MASTER SCHEDULE