Source: the reason for the failure “the Spectrum-R” it could be cosmic radiation
MOSCOW, January 14. /TASS/ — According to the source, experts suggest that the efficiency of the device was affected by the dose of radiation accumulated in electronics for nearly eight years.
The reason for the failure of the command transmitter of the radio telescope “Spektr-R” could be cosmic radiation that has accumulated in the electronics of the camera for nearly eight years of flight. This was reported on Monday TASS source in the space industry.
“As the inoperability of the receiving / transmitting device “the Spectrum-R” experts suggest the influence of the radiation dose accumulated over the period of the flight in the electronic components of the satellite”, — said the Agency interlocutor.
He explained that this is the third backup transmitter for receiving control commands from Earth, the first two — the primary and the second backup has failed previously. “However, experts of the RCC and NPO. Lavochkin do not exclude that the command line radio communication with the radio telescope will be able to recover,” he added.
The interviewee said that to solve such problems as “Spectrum”, two methods are used: “soft” means software reset, hard — reset with power-off of the satellite. “The second method is not suitable, as were the last set the receiver to work with and we will not be able to turn on the unit, there will be nobody to take the radio command from Earth. Soft method is now being implemented automatically: reboot is conducted every eight hours,” the source explained.
Loss of control
About the problems with the device “Spektr-R” has informed on Friday evening with reference to the head of the project “Radioastron” Yuri Kovalev the edition “the Newspaper.ru”. Academician of RAS, Director of Astro space center of FIAN (the customer of the project “Radioastron”) Nikolai Kardashev for its part, told TASS that the spacecraft receives the signal, but lost control of the satellite.