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As part of the European contribution to the Russian segment of the International Space Station (ISS), the European Robotic Arm (ERA) is designed under contract of the European Space Agency by Fokker Space as the Prime contractor. The particularly challenging aspect of the ERA thermal design is to enable ERA operation under all possible in-orbit thermal environmental conditions which are to be experienced throughout its 10 year life. These conditions can be between extreme cold without sunlight for hibernation to extreme hot with ERA operating in full sunlight in close vicinity to a large station item, for instance, the solar arrays. First a short description of the ERA system is given with a summary of the main thermal design features. The system level thermal balance test on the ERA Engineering Qualification Model (EQM) is intended to validate the system level thermal model, which consists of the subsystem thermal models as supplied by the respective subcontractors.

The MIPAS (Michelson Interferometer for Passive Atmospheric Sounding) instrument is part of the payload of the European Space Agency's (ESA) earth observation satellite ENVISAT-1. The instrument analyses the electromagnetic radiation from the earth atmosphere in the spectral region of 4μ to 14μ wavelength. In this way vertical concentration profiles of trace gases in the atmosphere can be determined. The instrument consists of two subassemblies: the optics module and the electronics module. The optics module is a casing in which the optical imaging equipment and the signal detectors are located. The electronics module houses the control units for the instrument and consists of several boxes mounted on the S/C in the vicinity of the optics module, interconnected with harness. In a previous paper the thermal design of the instrument was explained. This paper will focus on the thermal design verification of the optics module.

The MIPAS (Michelson Interferometer for Passive Atmospheric Sounding) instrument is part of the payload of the European Space Agency's (ESA) earth observation satellite ENVISAT-1. Most of the optical imaging equipment of MIPAS is required to operate at a temperature level around 200 K. The detectors and their optics have to be cooled down to approximately 70 K. Various thermal design measures have been taken to achieve these goals. In order to verify the thermal design the instrument behaviour has been represented in a mathematical model. A software tool for reduction of thermal models has been used to obtain small models for various purposes. The verification of the instrument thermal design also includes a thermal balance test.