DORNIER SATELLITE Systems has been training the crew of November's STS80 Space Shuttle mission to handle Germany's retrievable Astro-Spas (Shuttle Pallet Satellite) with the Orfeus (Orbital Retrievable Far and Extreme Ultraviolet Spectrometer) telescope.
The 14-day mission, to be known as the Orfeus-Spas II, will be the second deployment of the Orfeus on the Dornier-built Astro-Spas platform. It aims to continue investigations into the life cycle of stars. After completion of tests in Germany this month, the spacecraft will be shipped to the USA on 24 June to prepare for the planned 7 November launch.
The Orfeus telescope was developed by the German firm Kayser-Threde. It has a focal length of over 2.4m and a mirror diameter of 1m. It will be used to measure ultraviolet radiation in the wavelength range of 75-230km (40-125nm). Spectral analysis will then reveal information about the astrophysical processes being observed.
On its first mission, in September 1993, the Orfeus helped to prove the existence of intergalactic hydrogen clouds - considered to be the building blocks of the Universe - up to 2 billion light years away, and was also used to investigate white dwarf stars.
Source: Flight International
