[NLRS] Juno spacecraft

[Donn, WA2VOI]

Some of you may have participated....

73 Donn
WA2VOI/0

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "KENT BRITAIN" <wa5vjb at flash.net>

Sent: Wednesday, December 11, 2013 10:19 PM
Subject: FYI



Juno spacecraft hears amateur radio operators say 'Hi'

19 hours ago by Gary Galluzzo

Tony Rogers, the president of the University of Iowa ham radio
club, mans the equipment used to send a message to the Juno spacecraft
in October. The simple message "Hi" was sent repeatedly by ham radio
operators around the world. Credit: Tim Schoon.
(Phys.org) —Thousands of amateur (ham) radio operators around the
world were able to say "Hi" to NASA's Juno spacecraft Oct. 9 as it 
swung past Earth on its way to Jupiter.
According to Donald Kirchner, University of Iowa research
engineer on Juno and one of the coordinators of the all-volunteer "Say
Hi to Juno" project, all licensed amateur radio operators were invited
to participate by visiting a website and following posted 
instructions.
"The idea was to coordinate the efforts of amateur radio operators
all over the world, and send a message in Morse code that could be
received by the University of Iowa-designed-and-built instrument on 
the
Juno spacecraft," he says. "We know that over a thousand participated,
and probably many more than that."
Interestingly, Juno did not return the greeting or even decode the
message itself. Rather, after the amateur radio operators' messages 
were sent, the Juno team evaluated the Waves instrument data 
containing the
messages after the Oct. 9 flyby. The message was visible early in the
event when the spacecraft was still over 37,000 kilometers—about 
23,000
miles—from the Earth.
Kirchner notes that although previous space missions—Galileo on its
way to Jupiter and Cassini while headed for Saturn—were able to detect
shortwave radio transmissions during their Earth encounters, it was 
not
possible to decode intelligent information using the data from those
spacecraft.
According to Bill Kurth, UI research scientist and lead investigator
for the Waves instrument: "We believe this was the first intelligent
information to be transmitted to a passing interplanetary space
instrument, as simple as the message may seem," he says. "This was a 
way to involve a large number of people—those not usually associated 
with
Juno—in a small portion of the mission. This raises awareness, and 
we've already heard from some that they'll be motivated to follow the 
Juno
mission through its science phase at Jupiter."
Kurth is scheduled to participate in a press conference on the
scientific information gathered during Juno's Earth fly-by, as well as
the success of the "Say Hi to Juno" project, at 10:30 a.m. (PST) or
12:30 p.m. (CST) today, Tuesday, Dec. 10 during the Fall Meeting of 
the
American Geophysical Union in San Francisco.
Kirchner says that the project originated when public outreach staff
at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., wanted to 
know
if the UI receiver was able to pick up a voice message. Although that
isn't possible, Kurth and Kirchner came up with the idea that a slow
Morse code message should work.
Kirchner is an amateur radio operator, himself, and took the lead in
designing the project. His usual ham activities include being an
assistant emergency coordinator with the Johnson County Amateur Radio
Emergency Service, which works closely with the Johnson County 
Emergency Management Agency to provide backup and auxiliary 
communications.
To make the transmission to Juno, he enlisted a student organization, 
the UI Amateur Radio Club, to set up a temporary station on the roof 
of Van Allen Hall. Operating for a few days up to the flyby, he and 
other
club members contacted hundreds of stations in 40 states and 17
countries to raise awareness of the project.
The "say Hi" project was made possible by the fact that Juno passed
within 350 miles of the Earth's surface on Oct. 9 in a maneuver to 
gain
momentum for its July 2016 encounter with Jupiter.
Plans call for Juno to orbit Jupiter 33 times. Among a variety of
investigations, Juno will explore Jupiter's northern and southern 
lights by flying directly through the electrical current systems that 
generate them.
The Waves instrument was built at the UI by a group of about a dozen
scientists, engineers, and technicians, led by Kurth and Kirchner. 
Terry Averkamp, Chris Piker, and William Robinson, also an amateur 
radio
operator, assist in the operation of the Waves instrument and in the
data processing. UI researchers are Kurth and colleagues UI professor
Don Gurnett and research scientist George Hospodarsky.
The Juno project is a collaborative enterprise led by Scott Bolton,
of the Southwest Research Institute of San Antonio, including the UI 
and many other organizations and individuals.
 Explore further: Juno slingshots past Earth on its way to Jupiter