Milestone reached in development of electronics for ESA’s Comet Interceptor mission

At the Swedish Institute of Space Physics (IRF) in Uppsala, the development of one of the electronic boards for the Cometary Plasma Light Instrument (Compliment) has now reached an important milestone. The board has been tested, calibrated, and is ready for integration into the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Comet Interceptor mission.

The A5-sized electronics board controls the measurements from the instrument’s Langmuir probe, which is used to analyse the plasma environment surrounding a comet. During the rapid flyby – at speeds of up to 70 km/s – the instrument will switch between different measurement modes in two-second cycles to record parameters such as electron temperature, density, and electric fields.

The development of the board has taken place over several years and through multiple stages – from early prototypes to flight models built with radiation-hardened components adapted to the harsh space environment. The board has undergone thorough testing for functionality, electromagnetic compatibility, and thermal resilience, and is now ready for delivery.

“It is almost five years of work with development, production and testing by many of our competent engineers and scientists that has led us here, to a very well made unit ready to face the space environment. Five years is in the ESA context a short time and yet a lot of testing of the system remains, but this is mainly in the hands of our collaboration partners all over Europe.,” says Dan Ohlsson, who leads the engineering work for the instrument in Uppsala.

Compliment is a collaboration between IRF Uppsala, IRF Kiruna, BIRA in Belgium, and LPC2E in Orléans, France. The Swedish contribution is led by Niklas Edberg. Together with IRF’s other contribution, Sciena, the instrument will help map the charged gas – the plasma – surrounding a comet during a close flyby.

Comet Interceptor is an ESA mission planned for launch in 2028–2029. The spacecraft will wait in space until a newly discovered comet approaches the inner solar system, then intercept and study it at close range. The project is funded by the Swedish National Space Agency (SNSA).