DEVELOPMENT OF A PROTON AND ELECTRON SENSITIVE RADIATION MONITOR FOR SPACE AND STRATOSPHERIC TEST FLIGHTS

Date

2025-8-11

Author

Arslan, Mehlika Zeynep

Metadata

Show full item record

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Item Usage Stats

358
views

0
downloads

Cite This

In LEO, the radiation environment is composed primarily of electrons, protons and heavy ions with less than 1% contribution. Satellites must be designed to withstand this mixed radiation field. On-ground testing of electronic components help in mitigating some of these effects, while in-orbit radiation measurements help establish radiation heritage for future missions. To address these needs, YRM was developed to measure protons and electrons in 8 energy bins as well as heavy ions. SEE radiation tests were conducted on YRM’s electronic components using five different proton energies at METU-DBL and two RADNEXT facilities. Additionally, sensitivity calculations were performed for SB.1, the second development model of YRM, designed for sounding rocket missions. In parallel, a high-altitude balloon platform named YİB was developed to enable stratospheric radiation measurements, a first in Türkiye. A total of eight YİB flights were conducted from Ankara and Isparta meteorology facilities. The first four were preparatory missions measuring environmental conditions and included Geiger counters to measure electrons and gammas. After building confidence in the platform, subsequent flights involved test campaigns for scintillator-based electron detectors and SB.0, which was previously flown on ROKETSAN sounding rockets to altitudes up to 136 km. The electron detectors' performances were validated through the observation Regener-Pfötzer maximum and additional proton statistics were collected with SB.0. All payloads from 8 flights were successfully recovered and forms the foundation of testing equipment intended for space applications with HABs.

Subject Keywords

Radiation Environment, High-Altitude Balloon Platforms, Electron Detector, Proton/Heavy-Ion Telescope, Radiation Testing

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/115655

Collections

Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences, Thesis