Completed PLATO spacecraft is ready for final tests
By fitting its sunshield and solar panels, engineers have completed the construction of Plato, the European Space Agency’s mission to discover…
Payload
PLATO spreads its wings
By fitting its sunshield and solar panels, engineers recently completed the construction of PLATO, the European Space Agency’s mission to discover Earth-like exoplanets. …
PLATO arrived at ESA’s test centre by boat
The European Space Agency’s PLATO spacecraft has safely arrived at ESTEC, ESA’s technical heart in the Netherlands. There, engineers will…
Plato’s eyes meet brain
On 11 June, engineers at OHB’s facilities in Germany joined together the two main parts of ESA’s Plato mission. They used a…
Planet hunter Plato to fly on Ariane 6
Today, the European Space Agency (ESA) Director of Science, Carole Mundell, ESA Director of Space Transportation, Toni Tolker-Nielsen, and Arianespace Chief Commercial…
First PLATO Camera
The activities to integrate PLATO’s cameras have started in OHB’s Space Centre & Optics facility in Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany. One by one the…
PLATO focal plane assembly (FPA) preliminary design review hold in Madrid, June 2019
Between 17th June till 19th June, the preliminary design review co-location meeting of the FPA took place at INTA (Instituto…
Payload Module
The PLATO Payload comprises the cameras including focal planes and related electronics as well as the on-board data processing system….
Cameras
Each of the 24 normal and 2 fast cameras includes: the Telescope comprised of the Telescope Optical Unit (N-TOU and…
Telescope Optical Unit (TOU)
There is no general difference in the TOU design for normal and fast telescopes, but the latter will include filters…
Focal Plane Assembly (FPA)
The PLATO detectors are CCDs provided by e2v, model CCD270, specifically developed for this mission. They are built with two…
Front End Electronics (FEE)
The N-FEE operates the 4 CCDs of a normal camera, digitizes the image data and transfers them to the DPU….
Main Electronics Unit (MEU) and Data Processing Units (N-DPU)
Main Electronics Unit (MEU) and Data Processing Units (N-DPU) Each Main Electronics Unit (MEU) gathers in the same box: 6…
Fast Electronics Unit (FEU) and Data Processing Units (F-DPU)
Data of the two fast telescopes are processed by two Fast DPUs (F-DPU). The data acquisition and handling of each…
Ancillary Electrical Units (AEU)
The Ancillary Electronic Units (AEUs) have the following main functions: To supply secondary power to the Front End Electronics (FEE)…
Instrument Control Unit (ICU)
Both ICUs (main and redundant) are located in a single box and work in cold redundancy. Each ICU shall implement…
Payload accommodation and spacecraft interfaces
The accommodation of 24 normal + 2 fast cameras and associated electronic units has a mass allocation of 533 kg, with…
Optical Segmentation for a huge Field of View
Credit: INAF Achieving a very large FoV in common with a relatively arge aperture lead to fast focal ratio optics….
platomission.com 