ASRC Aerospace Design Team Supports the First Pluto Mission

New Horizons is the spacecraft which will be the first mission to Pluto. Currently it is scheduled to launch on Jan 17 at 1.24 PM which will start a 9 year mission to reach Pluto. The launch window is between Jan 17 to Feb 14, 2006. During the early part of the launch window the mission duration will be about 9 years. Later on in the window, late Jan and Feb, it may take anywhere between 9 and 15 years to get to Pluto.
The ASRC Aerospace Space Electronics Design Team was responsible for providing Ground Support Equipment. We provided the testbeds which were used to check the flight hardware and software. We also built the New Horizons Operations Simulator which will be in operation at the Applied Physics Laboratory for the duration of the mission. In addition, we were also involved in the design of flight hardware, namely the Radio Frequency (RF) switches used on the spacecraft.

Visit the websites below for more information:
http://pluto.jhuapl.edu
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/newhorizons/main/index.html - The NASA site for the mission