PROPOSED SPACE EXPERIMENTS OF SPACE TETHER TECHNOLOGY

摘要

This paper is to introduce two space tether experimental projects including; 1) a sounding rocket experiment in a ballistic flight extending lkm bare tape tether, and 2) a small satellite experiment on a circular orbit with the altitude 600km extending 20km electro-dynamic tether. The sounding rocket experiment employs bare electro-dynamic tether for the following two missions, one is much fundamental to make measurement on the bare tether, and the other is to use the bare tether as an atmospheric probe. The small satellite proposal is to verify the fundamental technology for such important tether technology as deployment and use of bare conductive tether in space. The objective is to verify the two fundamental and important aspects of the tether technology including the orbitrnelevation without using fuel, and the Alfven wave experiment. These two projects towards space tether experiments are introduced in the paper and discussed in detail including the present status for the accomplishment of these projects. The paper will also include discussion of the further future plan to accomplish the space tether technology which will play an important role for our future space activity.