CoRoT 2005 Events

• Thermal tests of the CoRoT payload in vacuum chamber, at Intespace, from 25 November to 4 December 2005
   

The CoRoT telescope, flying on a polar orbit at 896 km, has been designed to filter the thermal perturbations coming from the Earth environment (day/night cycling during periods with eclipses). Thus, these thermal tests, beyond the basic objective of technical qualification, were crucial to characterize in details the behavior of the instrument and check the overall thermal modelling. As a result of this campaign of measurements in the SIMLES chamber, at Intespace, we are now able to show the excellent thermal performances of the instrument, and in particular thoses of the most critical sub-systems: the afocal telescope, the camera and the upper part of the equipment bay hosting the analogical electronics. These tests also allowed to verify, in vacuum and at -40° C (focal unit regulation temperature), the optical performances and the detector radiometry (noises in the image spots).

• Press conference and meeting with members of Parliament, from 15 to 17 November 2005
   

The conference with written press, radio and television took place in the Intespace clean rooms, round the CoRoT payload in progress of being functionnally tested. Annie Baglin, P.I of the mission, was among us to answer journalists' questions. On November 17, the CNES project team went on with this communication event, receiving a delegation of members of Parliament, invited to visit the Toulouse Space Center.
The CoRoT instrument has successfully passed a complete set of mechanical tests and must still undergo a series of thermal tests in the vacuum chamber, before delivery to Thales Alenia Space.

• 2nd CoRoT Workshop in Brazil, from 2 to 6 November 2005
   

The 2nd CoRoT Workshop in Brazil, held in Ubatuba and organized by the University of Sao Paulo, was the opportunity of fruitful exchanges between researchers preparing the CoRoT mission in Europe and Brazil. Many subjects were discussed : rotation and magnetic field effects inside stars, simulation of stellar activity in light curves, observation of young cluster (PMS stars), dynamics of extrasolar planetary systems, migration and metallicity...
Some of the Additional Programs short-listed or selected by the 16th Scientific Committee were on the agenda, and the workshop gathered for the first time all PhD students and engineers coming from Brazil to work in France for CoRoT. Lastly, it has been the first technical meeting between CNES and INPE teams since the signature of the cooperation agreement on June 14. The Alcantara ground station will be on-site, ready for qualification tests, in the next few months.

• Campaign of mechanical tests, at Intespace, from 7 to 18 October 2005
   

• Last steps of instrument integration, from 16 August to 8 September 2005
   

After delivery of the baffle and a series of optical tests, the CoRoT instrument was integrated in the clean rooms of the Toulouse Space Center, from 16.08 to 08.09.2005. The operations performed by the CNES integration team consisted in setting the camera inside the telescope, then in assembling the optical part with the equipment bay, which is a very touchy operation. The following activities were to put in place the focal unit radiator, the MLI sheets and the probes for the environment tests to be made in the next few weeks. The instrument was transferred to Intespace on 9 September 2005.

• Preliminary Cosmodrome Readiness Review (PCRR), in Baïkonour, 21-24 June 2005
   

This one-week technical trip to Baïkonour (Kazakhstan) allowed the satellite teams from CNES and Alcatel to better know the Starsem facilities which will be used for the CoRoT launch campaign. Among the reviewed subjects : An-124 aircraft offloading, campaign scenario, safety for satellite fueling operations, remote monitoring, launch pad activity. The launch fo CoRoT is foreseen summertime 2006, by a SOYUZ 2-1B rocket.

• Signing of the agreement establishing the Brazilian contribution to CoRoT, at Paris Air Show, on 14 June 2005
   

During last Paris Air Show, CNES President Yannick d'Escatha and AEB President Sergio Mauricio Gaudenzi signed the agreement establishing the participation of Brazil in CoRoT. The agreement adresses the reception of the scientific telemetry data by the Alcantara earth terminal and the implication of Brazilian researchers and engineers in the development of the user ground segment. Observatories in Brazil will also contribute to the scientific program of joint ground observations. In return, the astronomers community in Brazil will have a privileged access to the CoRoT data through several Co-Investigators.

• 8th COROTWEEK 23 to 27 May 2005 in Toulouse.
   

This scientific workshop, organized by CNES with the Midi-Pyrénées Observatory, was the opportunity to bring together more than 120 researchers coming from the CoRoT community.
The sessions were devoted to the preparation of the first year of in-flight activity:

• choice of the stellar fields to be observed in the first long runs,
• call for ideas relative to the additional programs,
• blind tests (on simulated light curves) for the exoplanet search and seismology,
• choice of a method to select the aperture photometry reference masks used by the exoplanet channel on-board software,
• workplan for the joint ground observations.

Three new thematic groups have been created: DAT (asteroseismology data analysis), Binary Systems, ACROCoRoT (convection, rotation, surface activity).

Fifteen months before expected launch date (summertime 2006), this workshop gave the chance to every participant to see the CoRoT telescope, being integrated in our clean rooms, and also to visit the satellite control center.

• Technical meeting at the Vienna Observatory on 19 April 2005
   

• First light of the CoRoT telescope (during the night 13-14 April 2005)
   

• Satellite Critical Design Review, at Cannes, on 11 April 2005.
   

• External baffle final qualification tests on 30 March 2005.
   

• Beginning of the optical testing of the flight model instrument (afocal and dioptric camera), at CNES, on 21 March 2005.
   

• System Interface Review on 4 March 2005.
   

• Beginning of the instrument AIT in CNES, on 6 January 2005.