Transistors on NASA’s Europa satellite can’t handle space radiation

Mission at risk and repair could require ‘baking’ the MOSFETS inside the satellite.

Jowi Morales

Engineers working on the Europa Clipper satellite have discovered that its onboard transistors are more vulnerable to radiation damage than anticipated, imperilling the mission. While fixing this issue might be as simple as replacing the affected parts, they’re already sealed inside an electronics vault inside the satellite. This means NASA has to find novel ways to repair the MOSFETs without opening up the satellite, like heating up the vault to cook the transistors. The Europa Clipper was designed to study Jupiter’s moon of the same name. The discovery was made when the people working at NASA’s JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory), the lead developers of the project, attended a conference with other engineers working on a classified satellite project that used the same equipment. They revealed they were having issues with…

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APC (Digital) - 1 Issue, September 2024

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