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| Small Bodies Mission Support |
This spacecraft was launched in 1978 as the International Sun-Earth Explorer 3, third in a series of Explorer-class missions to investigate details of the interactions between the Sun (and solar wind) and the Earth's magnetosphere. The spacecraft carried instruments to measure plasmas, energetic particles, waves and fields. This last mission in the series was launched into a heliocentric orbit at the L1 Langrangian libration point 235 Earth radii on the sunward side of Earth.
In 1982 the spacecraft was renamed the International Cometary Explorer (ICE) and, through a complex series of Earth and Moon flybys, was sent on a trajectory to intercept comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner. The primary objective of the ICE mission was to study the interaction between the solar wind and the cometary atmosphere. The ICE made particle, field and plasma measurements as it passed through the plasma tail of 21P/Giacobini-Zinner, then continued on to pass between the Sun and comet 1P/Halley in late March 1986 as other missions (Giotto, VEGA, Planet-A, MS-T5) were also observing that comet.
Spacecraft operations were terminated in May 1997.
The ISEE 3 Mission Description is available from the National Space Science Data Center database.
The SBN is the PDS node leading the efforts to restore and archive the data from the small body missions such as the International Cometary Explorer.
| Instrument/Investigation | Measuring | Small Bodies Data available below | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Solar Wind Plasma (SWPLAS) | Ion velocity distribution | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Vector Helium Magnetometer (MAG) | Magnetic field and low-frequency variations | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ultralow-energy charge analyzer (ULECA) | Ions in the 3-560 KeV/charge range | none
| Ultralow-energy wide-angle telescope | (ULEWAT) Ions in the 0.2-80 MeV/nucleon range
| none
| Ultralow-ebergy Z, E, and Q | (ULEZEQ) Ions in the 0.4-6 MeV/nucleon range
| none
| Medium Energy Cosmic Rays
| Solar and galactic cosmic rays
| none
| High-Energy Cosmic Rays
| Isotopic abundances in primary cosmic rays for H through Ni
| none
| Cosmic-Ray Energy Spectrum
| Particle propagation within the solar system and properties of the
interplanetary medium
| none
| Plasma Wave Spectrum Analyzer | (PLAWAV) Plasma-wave studies
|
21P/Giacobini-Zinner
PLAWAV_BFIELD, | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner PLAWAV_EFIELD Energetic Particle Anisotropy Spectrometer | (EPAS) Energy spectrum and 3-D angular
distribution of 0.035-1.6MeV protons
|
21P/Giacobini-Zinner
| Interplanetary and Solar Electrons
| Spectra and anisotropies of interplanetary and solar
electrons in the transition energy range between solar wind and low-energy
cosmic rays
| none
| Radio Mapping of Solar Wind Disturbances | (RADWAV) Direction of type-III solar bursts
|
21P/Giacobini-Zinner
| Ion Composition Instrument | (ICI) Charge state and isotopic composition of the solar wind
|
21P/Giacobini-Zinner
| Cosmic Ray Isotope Spectrometer
| Isotopic constitution of solar matter and galactic cosmic-ray
sources, nucleuosynthesis, and astrophysical particle acceleration
| none
| X-ray and Gamma-ray Bursts
| Solar-flare X-rays and transient cosmic gamma-ray
bursts
| none
| Gamma-ray Bursts
| High-resolution spectra of gamma-ray burst photons between 0.05 and 6.5
MeV
| none
| |
| Instrument/ Investigation Description | Target | Description of Available Data | Data Link |
|---|---|---|---|
| EPAS | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | International Halley Watch data | CDROM |
| ICI | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | International Halley Watch data | CDROM |
| MAG | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | International Halley Watch data | CDROM |
| PLAWAV | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | International Halley Watch PLAWAV_BFIELD data | CDROM |
| International Halley Watch PLAWAV_EFIELD data | CDROM | ||
| RADWAV | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | International Halley Watch data | CDROM |
| SWPLAS | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | International Halley Watch data | CDROM |
| ULECA | 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | International Halley Watch data | CDROM |
| Target | Target Type | Other Data Sets Targeting this Object |
|---|---|---|
| 21P/Giacobini-Zinner | Comet | International Halley Watch CDROM Archive, HAL_0024, Comets Giacobini-Zinner and Crommelin Archive |