In approving Europa Clipper’s launch, NASA and JPL claim its non-spec transistors will “heal” themselves in Jupiter orbit
Europa in true color, taken by Juno September 2022.
Click for full image.
In making the decision to allow Europa Clipper to be launched on a Falcon Heavy on October 10, 2024, NASA and JPL officials explained that after several months of testing, they believe the improperly hardened transistors installed throughout the orbiter will “heal” themselves while in the low radiation portions of its orbit around Jupiter.
[The testing] showed the transistors in question will, in effect, heal themselves during the 20 days between the high radiation doses the probe will receive during each of 49 close flybys of Europa, all of them deep in Jupiter’s powerful magnetic field and radiation environment.
In addition, onboard heaters can be used as needed to raise the temperature of affected transistors, improving the recovery process. “After extensive testing and analysis of the transistors, the Europa Clipper project and I personally have high confidence we can complete the original mission for exploring Europa as planned,” said Jordan Evans, Europa Clipper project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
I hope this analysis is right, though I fear there is a lot of wishful-thinking involved. It could be however that this testing, in combination with what engineers have learned during Juno’s so-far 64 orbits around Jupiter, might have reassured them.
We however will not know for sure until Europa Clipper is on its way and reaches Jupiter in 2030.
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Europa in true color, taken by Juno September 2022.
Click for full image.
In making the decision to allow Europa Clipper to be launched on a Falcon Heavy on October 10, 2024, NASA and JPL officials explained that after several months of testing, they believe the improperly hardened transistors installed throughout the orbiter will “heal” themselves while in the low radiation portions of its orbit around Jupiter.
[The testing] showed the transistors in question will, in effect, heal themselves during the 20 days between the high radiation doses the probe will receive during each of 49 close flybys of Europa, all of them deep in Jupiter’s powerful magnetic field and radiation environment.
In addition, onboard heaters can be used as needed to raise the temperature of affected transistors, improving the recovery process. “After extensive testing and analysis of the transistors, the Europa Clipper project and I personally have high confidence we can complete the original mission for exploring Europa as planned,” said Jordan Evans, Europa Clipper project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
I hope this analysis is right, though I fear there is a lot of wishful-thinking involved. It could be however that this testing, in combination with what engineers have learned during Juno’s so-far 64 orbits around Jupiter, might have reassured them.
We however will not know for sure until Europa Clipper is on its way and reaches Jupiter in 2030.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in the past two weeks has the mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuses to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Very sad.
They can’t even create a good Story and blind us with science, to make themselves look Brilliant.
It needs to read like this:
“JPL Discovers Advanced Methods to Harden Electronics, In Space!”
I read a very good analysis of “annealing” and how it applies to electronics in high radiation environments, and specifically to this case, which was, unfortunately behind a paywall. But basically yes, it’s well known and proven that transistors take damage when exposed to a burst of radiation, and then “heal” themselves afterwards. And apparently, it was testing and analysis around this exact behavior that led to the recognition that these transistors might not be up to spec. The short version is that it was discovered that as produced and certified, they are in spec in terms of initial reaction to a high radiation dose, but may, or may not, heal themselves sufficiently afterwards. It was apparently never expected that they would be sufficiently hardened to operate in the target radiation environment without taking damage, but it was expected that the annealing process would be able to bring them back into spec each time, and that may or may not actually be true. And apparently the details are very esoteric and proprietary, and so while NASA/JPL is now saying that they feel after investigation the transistors will be good enough, the only way non-specialists in the general public are going to know if that’s correct or wishful thinking is to wait and see what happens.
I read about silver being able to heal at small scales.
Some metals grow whiskers IIRC
In college these guys got test papers returned with “Your circuit is on fire!” written on the front.
I AM HAVING REAL DIFFICULTY IN NOT GIVING A SNARKY REPLY SO I THOUGHT i WOULD REPLY IN ALL CAPS
IF THE COMPONENTS WERE NOT SUPPLIED AS RADIATION HARDENED THE ALL THE TIME AND FUNDS WILL BE WASTED
A work-around to lessen radiation?
https://phys.org/news/2024-08-missions-jupiter-moon-europa.amp
For future missions
https://phys.org/news/2024-09-space-cosmic-boron-nitride-nanotube.html
https://phys.org/news/2024-09-national-lab-expertise-space.html