KUALA LUMPUR, May 24 (Bernama) -- The European Space Agency (ESA) has awarded Teledyne e2v -- a division of Teledyne Technologies Incorporated, with the second phase of a US$47 million (RM183.30 million) contract to produce high-end Charge Coupled Device (CCD) visible light image sensors for the PLATO (Planetary Transits and Oscillations of stars) mission.
PLATO is a planet hunting spacecraft that will seek out and research Earth like exoplanets around Sun like stars. About 100 Teledyne e2v large area CCDs will allow the mission to detect minute changes in the apparent brightness of stars, orbited by planets.
After a successful review of the first phase, Teledyne e2v has been authorised to start work on phase two of the contract, a statement said.
The contract also includes manufacturing the wafers and the assembly, test and delivery of 114 CCDs. They will form the biggest optical array ever to be launched into space -- currently planned for 2026.
During its lifetime, PLATO will precisely measure the size, mass and age of planets, survey a large area of the sky and study the full diversity of thousands of stars and planetary systems across galactic neighbourhood.
PLATO is expected to discover many more exoplanets, which will then be further investigated and analysed by ground based telescopes, generating a huge amount of follow up activity by the astronomy community.
-- BERNAMA
No comments:
Post a Comment