CaltechAUTHORS
Published 2003 | Version public
Journal Article Metadata-only

The Genesis Solar Wind Concentrator

Creators

Abstract

The primary goal of the Genesis Mission is to collect solar wind ions and, from their analysis, establish key isotopic ratios that will help constrain models of solar nebula formation and evolution. The ratios of primary interest include ^(17)O/^(16)O and ^(18)O/^(16)O to ±0.1%, ^(15)N/^(14)N to ±1%, and the Li, Be, and B elemental and isotopic abundances. The required accuracies in N and O ratios cannot be achieved without concentrating the solar wind and implanting it into low-background target materials that are returned to Earth for analysis. The Genesis Concentrator is designed to concentrate the heavy ion flux from the solar wind by an average factor of at least 20 and implant it into a target of ultra-pure, well-characterized materials. High-transparency grids held at high voltages are used near the aperture to reject >90% of the protons, avoiding damage to the target. Another set of grids and applied voltages are used to accelerate and focus the remaining ions to implant into the target. The design uses an energy-independent parabolic ion mirror to focus ions onto a 6.2 cm diameter target of materials selected to contain levels of O and other elements of interest established and documented to be below 10% of the levels expected from the concentrated solar wind. To optimize the concentration of the ions, voltages are constantly adjusted based on real-time solar wind speed and temperature measurements from the Genesis ion monitor. Construction of the Concentrator required new developments in ion optics; materials; and instrument testing and handling.

Additional Information

© 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Received 15 December 2001; Accepted in final form 21 May 2002. The authors would like to acknowledge NASA contract number W-19,272 for supporting this work. The design, development, and construction of the Concentrator would not have been possible without the help of many individuals. The authors would like to thank the following outstanding individuals: Diane Albert, Frank Ameduri, Matt Anderson, Richard Bramlett, Randy Edwards, Brian Henneke, James Lake, and Stacy Rupiper of Los Alamos National Laboratory; Dennis Guerrero, Irene Arevalos, Greg Dirks, Jeff Roese, Toby Stecklein, Jack Taguiam, Syrrel Rogillio, and James Sanders of the Southwest Research Institute; Chet Sasaki, Virgil Mireles and Don Sevilla of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory; Lada Adamac of Caltech; Allen Dorn of Screen Technology Group; Jerry Spieckerman of Marketech, Inc.; Steve Good of Reynolds Industries, Inc.; Kenneth Bedard formerly of Precimeter, Inc.; and David King and Joseph Maciejewsky of Technology Assessment and Transfer, Inc., Wear Sciences Division.

Additional details

Identifiers

Eprint ID
57349
DOI
10.1023/A:1024422011514
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20150507-150031683

Related works

Describes
10.1023/A:1024422011514 (DOI)

Funding

NASA
W-19,272

Dates

Created
2015-05-08
Created from EPrint's datestamp field
Updated
2021-11-10
Created from EPrint's last_modified field

Caltech Custom Metadata

Caltech groups
Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences (GPS)