Planck an overview of the spacecraft

Abstract

The two science missions Herschel, an observatory-type mission, and Planck, a survey mission, are combined in one program within ESA's long-term science program. This paper deals with Planck. The objective for Planck is to image systematically the whole sky simultaneously with two scientific instruments in nine frequency channels between 30 and 900 GHz to unravel the temperature fluctuations, i.e. the anisotropy, of the cosmic background radiation. Both satellites, have been launched together from the European Space Port in Kourou, French Guiana, on a single Ariane 5 launcher, the orbits will be Lissajous orbits around the 2nd Lagrange Point, "so called" L2 of the Earth-Sun system. This paper gives an overview of the Planck spacecraft including the scientific instruments and the on ground testing. © 2010 American Institute of Physics.