The command and data subsystem consisted of multiple microprocessors and a high-speed data bus. Propulsion was provided by a bipropellant system of twelve 10-newton thrusters and one 400 newton engine. The spacecraft power source was a pair of radioisotope thermoelectric generators.
There were eleven subsystems and nine scientific instruments on the orbiter. The rotor and stator were connected by a spin bearing assembly, which conducted power via slip rings and data signals via rotary transformers. This design accommodated the different requirements of remote sensing instruments (mounted on the stator) and fields and particles instruments (mounted on the rotor) spacecraft engineering subsystems were also mounted on the rotor. The rotor (or spun section) turned at approximately three revolutions per minute while the stator (or despun section) maintained a fixed orientation in space. The Planetary Missions Program Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, executes program management of the Europa Clipper mission.Galileo used a dual-spin attitude stabilization system. APL designed the main spacecraft body in collaboration with JPL and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. Managed by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena, California, JPL leads the development of the Europa Clipper mission in partnership with APL for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Understanding Europa’s habitability will help enable researchers to better understand how life developed on Earth and the potential for finding life beyond our planet. While Europa Clipper is not a life-detection mission, it will conduct a detailed exploration of Europa and investigate whether the icy moon, with its subsurface ocean, has the capability of supporting life. This interdisciplinary research field that studies the conditions of distant worlds that could harbor life as we know it. Missions such as Europa Clipper contribute to the field of astrobiology. After traveling for nearly six years and over 1.8 billion miles (2.9 billion kilometers), it will achieve orbit around Jupiter in 2030. Then, the next steps will be a wide variety of tests as the spacecraft moves toward its 2024 launch period. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltechīy the end of 2022, most of the flight hardware and the remainder of the science instruments are expected to be complete. This time-lapse video follows NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft during its carefully choreographed move into the High Bay 1 clean room the Spacecraft Assembly Facility at JPL. The fuel and oxidizer they’ll hold will flow to an array of 24 engines, where they will create a controlled chemical reaction to produce thrust in deep space. Inside the core are Europa Clipper’s two propulsion tanks. If placed end to end, the cabling would stretch almost 2,100 feet (640 meters) – enough to wrap around a U.S. It contains thousands of wires and connectors handcrafted at APL. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltechīright copper cabling snakes around the orbiter’s aluminum core. The vault will protect the spacecraft’s electronics, while the nadir deck will provide a stable platform for science instruments. Europa Clipper’s vault, with the nadir deck attached, is prepared for a move to the High Bay 1 clean room of the Spacecraft Assembly Facility at JPL.