Overview
The deep space mission to Epsilon Eridani is designed to launch a spacecraft and send it to Epsilon Eridani, the nearest exo-planet populated star system. The spacecraft is to be launched at Cape Canaveral on 2/10/2012. It will take approximately 78,000 years for the spacecraft to reach the Epsilon Eridani. During this voyage, most components on the satellite are turned off to conserve energy. The spacecraft will utilize an electrodeless plasma thruster powered by a Heatpipe Power System nuclear fission reactor to provide electricity to all of the electronics as well as the thrusters.
Because of the extremely large distance, RF communications require a 25m diameter hybrid inflatable parabolic dish antenna. The spacecraft will carry an special designed inflatable antenna that combines a fixed parabolic dish with an inflatable reflector annulus to minimize weight and make it feasible to launch such a large dish antenna. The large dish is protected by a radome so it is not damaged during the voyage.
The spacecraft is also equipped with a thermal control system and is heavily blanketed to protect the electronics from the thermal energy of the sun and Epsilon Eridani and the coldness of space. An auto-navigation system will be utilized by the spacecraft to guide it during its voyage so it will not require constant monitoring from Earth.
Once the spacecraft has reached a distance of 1 light year from Epsilon Eridani, a specially designed telescope will begin to capture images of the Epsilon Eridani system and communication components will be fully turned on. High resolution images will be sent back to the earth via the hybrid inflatable parabolic dish antenna. The spacecraft will orbit the system for as long as it can and will continue to send images of the system to Earth.
Each design aspect are described in detail in the following sections:
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