Kristen Smith
NASA has awarded Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory a $20.5 million contract to develop two Suprathermal Ion Sensor instruments for the Lagrange 1 Series project satellites under the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Next Program.
Under the cost-plus-fixed-fee contract, Johns Hopkins APL is expected to complete the sensor development work, including performing integration, test, verification and evaluation activities and providing launch and post-launch support, by January 2034, NASA said Tuesday.
Contract work will be performed at the organization’s facility in Laurel, Maryland, and at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and Kennedy Space Center.
The instruments will be designed to measure suprathermal ions and electrons and provide real-time data to NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center, which issues forecasts, warnings and alerts regarding space weather disturbances that could impact electric power, communications and navigation systems.
The sensors will also enable characterizing solar ejections, including coronal mass ejections, co-rotating interaction regions and interplanetary shocks, to help estimate the arrival time and strength of solar wind shocks.
