The design and realization of electronics package for the flux gate magnetometer (MAG) payload on board Aditya-L1 spacecraft

Magnetometers are regularly flown onboard space missions to measure the local magnetic field. Aditya-L1 is the first Indian solar mission placed in a halo-orbit around the first Lagrangian (L1) point to continuously observe and study the Sun. The flux gate magnetometer (MAG) is one of the seven payloads on board the Aditya-L1 spacecraft aimed to measure the slowly varying interplanetary magnetic field in the space around the L1 point. The MAG payload consists of two identical flux gate sensors and an electronics package for the sensor operations and processing the signals picked up by the two sensors. Two sets of MAG sensors are installed on a 6 m long deployable boom so that by invoking differential measurements, the magnetic field generated by the spacecraft itself can be negated. In this paper, the technical details of the electronics package of the MAG payload and its performance are presented.