To the stratosphere and beyond! Super-pressure balloon flight overview for the Super-pressure Balloon-borne Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT)

Susan F. Redmond; Steven J. Benton; Christopher J. Damaren; Spencer W. Everett; Aurelien A. Fraisse; Ajay S. Gill; John W. Hartley; David Harvey; Bradley Holder; Eric M. Huff; Mathilde Jauzac; William C. Jones; David Lagattuta; Jason S.-Y. Leung; Lun Li; Thuy Vy T. Luu; Richard Massey; Jacqueline E. McCleary; Johanna M. Nagy; C. Barth Netterfield; Emaad Paracha; Jason D. Rhodes; Andrew Robertson; L. Javier Romualdez; Jürgen Schmoll; Mohamed M. Shaaban; Ellen L. Sirks; Georgios N. Vassilakis; André Z. Vitorelli

doi:10.1117/12.3020296

11 September 2024 To the stratosphere and beyond! Super-pressure balloon flight overview for the Super-pressure Balloon-borne Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT)

Susan F. Redmond, Steven J. Benton, Christopher J. Damaren, Spencer W. Everett, Aurelien A. Fraisse, Ajay S. Gill, John W. Hartley, David Harvey, Bradley Holder, Eric M. Huff, Mathilde Jauzac, William C. Jones, David Lagattuta, Jason S.-Y. Leung, Lun Li, Thuy Vy T. Luu, Richard Massey, Jacqueline E. McCleary, Johanna M. Nagy, C. Barth Netterfield, Emaad Paracha, Jason D. Rhodes, Andrew Robertson, L. Javier Romualdez, Jürgen Schmoll, Mohamed M. Shaaban, Ellen L. Sirks, Georgios N. Vassilakis, André Z. Vitorelli

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 13094, Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes X; 130942P (2024) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3020296
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2024, Yokohama, Japan

Conference Poster

Abstract

The Super-pressure Balloon-borne Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT) was a diffraction limited 0.5m optical-to-near-UV telescope that was designed to study dark matter via cluster weak lensing. SuperBIT launched from Wanaka, New Zealand via NASA’s super-pressure balloon (SPB) technology on April 16, 2023 and remained in the stratosphere for 40 days. During the flight, SuperBIT obtained multi-band images for 30 science targets; data analysis to produce shear measurements for each target is ongoing. SuperBIT’s pointing system comprised three nested frames that stablized the entire telescope within 0.34 arcseconds rms, plus a back-end tip-tilt mirror that achieved focal plane image stability of 0.055 arcseconds rms during 300 second exposures. The power system reached full charge every day and never dropped below 30% at night. All components remained within their temperature limits, and actively controlled components remained within a standard deviation of ∼0.1K of their set point. In this paper we provide an overview of the flight trajectory behaviour and flight operations. The first two days of the flight were used for payload characterization and telescope alignment after which all night time was dedicated to science observations. Target scheduling was performed by an on-board “Autopilot” system which tracked available targets and prioritized completing targets over starting new targets. SuperBIT was the first balloon telescope to fly a Starlink dish to enable high-bandwidth communications with the payload. Prior to flight termination, two Data Retrieval System modules were deployed to provide a redundant data recovery method.

(2024) Published by SPIE. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.

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Susan F. Redmond, Steven J. Benton, Christopher J. Damaren, Spencer W. Everett, Aurelien A. Fraisse, Ajay S. Gill, John W. Hartley, David Harvey, Bradley Holder, Eric M. Huff, Mathilde Jauzac, William C. Jones, David Lagattuta, Jason S.-Y. Leung, Lun Li, Thuy Vy T. Luu, Richard Massey, Jacqueline E. McCleary, Johanna M. Nagy, C. Barth Netterfield, Emaad Paracha, Jason D. Rhodes, Andrew Robertson, L. Javier Romualdez, Jürgen Schmoll, Mohamed M. Shaaban, Ellen L. Sirks, Georgios N. Vassilakis, and André Z. Vitorelli "To the stratosphere and beyond! Super-pressure balloon flight overview for the Super-pressure Balloon-borne Imaging Telescope (SuperBIT)", Proc. SPIE 13094, Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes X, 130942P (11 September 2024); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3020296

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