Earth and moon observations by thermal infrared imager on Hayabusa2 and the application to detectability of asteroid 162173 Ryugu

Citation

Okada T, Fukuhara T, Tanaka S, Taguchi M, Arai T, Senshu H, Demura H, Ogawa Y, Kouyama T, Sakatani N, Takita J, Sekiguchi T, Helbert J, Mueller TG & Hagermann A (2018) Earth and moon observations by thermal infrared imager on Hayabusa2 and the application to detectability of asteroid 162173 Ryugu. Planetary and Space Science, 158, pp. 46-52. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pss.2018.05.007

Abstract
Thermal Infrared Imager TIR on Hayabusa2 has proven its in-flight performance to detect celestial bodies during the cruise phase, especially by the observations of the Earth and the Moon before and after the Earth swing-by on 3rd of December 2015. The result indicates that the target C-type asteroid 162173 Ryugu will be detected from the distance of 3000 km at the beginning of the approach phase, and that a C-type small moon larger than 1 m will be detected from the home position, 20 km from the asteroid, if it orbits around the asteroid.

Keywords
Thermo-physical properties; Thermo-physical asteroid model; Thermal inertia; TIR; Hayabusa2

Notes
Additional co-authors: Hayabusa2 TIR Team

Journal
Planetary and Space Science: Volume 158