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Study of cosmic dust particles on board LDEF: The FRECOPA experiments AO138-1 and AO138-2Two experiments, within the French Cooperative Payload (FRECOPA) and devoted to the detection of cosmic dust, were flown on the LDEF. A variety of sensors and collecting devices have made possible the study of impact processes on materials of technological interest. Preliminary examination of hypervelocity impact features gives valuable data on size distribution and nature of interplanetary dust particles in low earth orbit, within the 0.5 to 300 micrometer size range. Most of the events detected on the trailing face of LDEF are expected to be the result of impacts of meteoritic particles only. So far, chemical analysis of craters by EDS clearly shows evidence of elements (Na, Mg, Si, S, Ca, and Fe) consistent with cosmic origin. Systematic occurrence of C and O in crater residues is an important result, to be compared with the existence of CHON particles detected in P-Halley comet nucleus. Crater size distribution is in good agreement with results from other dust experiments flown on LDEF. However, no crater smaller than 1.5 micron was observed, thus suggesting a cutoff in the near earth particle distribution. Possible origin and orbital evolution of micrometeoroids is discussed.
Document ID
19920014067
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Paper
Authors
Mandeville, J. C.
(Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Toulon (France)., United States)
Borg, Janet
(Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique Orsay, France)
Date Acquired
September 6, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 1992
Publication Information
Publication: NASA. Langley Research Center, LDEF: 69 Months in Space. First Post-Retrieval Symposium, Part 1
Subject Category
Astrophysics
Accession Number
92N23310
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Work of the US Gov. Public Use Permitted.
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