Mini-EUSO: A high resolution detector for the study of terrestrial and cosmic UV emission from the International Space Station

TL;DR

Mini-EUSO is a high-resolution UV telescope on the ISS designed to study Earth's atmospheric phenomena, space debris, and cosmic rays, providing valuable data for atmospheric science and space safety.

Contribution

It introduces a novel high-resolution UV imaging instrument on the ISS for atmospheric, space debris, and cosmic ray research, serving as a pathfinder for future space-based cosmic ray detection.

Findings

Mapping Earth's UV emissions with 6.11 km resolution

Detection of atmospheric events like TLEs and meteors

Assessment of space debris and cosmic ray signals

Abstract

The Mini-EUSO instrument is a UV telescope to be placed inside the International Space Station (ISS), looking down on the Earth from a nadir-facing window in the Russian Zvezda module. Mini-EUSO will map the earth in the UV range (300 - 400 nm) with a spatial resolution of 6.11km and a temporal resolution of 2.5 $\mu$s, offering the opportunity to study a variety of atmospheric events such as transient luminous events (TLEs) and meteors, as well as searching for strange quark matter and bioluminescence. Furthermore, Mini-EUSO will be used to detect space debris to verify the possibility of using a EUSO-class telescope in combination with a high energy laser for space debris remediation. The high-resolution mapping of the UV emissions from Earth orbit allows Mini-EUSO to serve as a pathfinder for the study of Extreme Energy Cosmic Rays (EECRs) from space by the JEM-EUSO collaboration.