Instrumentation II

Magnetometers and Calibration

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Generic Space Instrument

Instrument Instrument Spacecraft

Analogue Digital

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 What do we mean by DC space magnetometer?

• Three B field components in range 0 - 30Hz

• Wide measurement range 0.01nT – 50,000nT
• Robust, reliable, high performance (low noise – stable offsets)
• Optimised for power, mass, radiation etc.
• Sensors fitted to a boom away from S/C magnetic disturbance

Sensor Technology Range (T) Suitable for space

SQUID 10-14 – 10 No – Cryostat needed
Optically Pumped 10-14 – 10-4 Yes – B and |B|
Fluxgate 10-10 – 10-4 Yes – B
Nuclear Precession 10-11 – 10-2 Yes - |B|
Hall Effect 10-3 – 10-2 No
Search Coil 10-12 – 106 Yes for AC fields

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 Optically Pumped Magnetometers
• Heritage as a vector magnetometer
• Vector and Scalar Operation (on Cassini)
• Vector Mode
– RF discharge maintained in a He lamp – 1.08um
– Creates radiation - channelled into a He absorption cell
– He cell atoms are in meta-stable state also by RF discharge
– Presence of ambient field causes Zeeman splitting
– Emergent radiation is measured by IR detector
– The measured absorption depends on efficiency of the optical pumping
– Helmholtz coils around cell apply rotating sweep fields
– Signal is obtained by measuring the modulation of rotating sweep fields
applied by surrounding Helmholtz coils
– Results in a sinusoid whose magnitude and phase give the size and
direction of the field
– Signal detected and fedback into the sensor coils

• Scalar mode
– 1.08um radiation and frequency modulated AC field applied.
– Absorption greatest when AC frequency = Larmor frequency.
– Larmor frequency related to |B| by fundamental constants
– Result is a very accurate measure of absolute field

Smith 1975

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Proton Precession Magnetometers

• Proton rich material eg distilled water

• Surrounded by induction coil
• AC field induces proton precession
• Once induced field switched off
• Protons relax back to ambient field
precession
• This induces a small AC signal in coil
• Proportional to ambient field
• Suitable for slow varying fields
• Used for absolute measurement of B Huggard 1970
• Used on Earth mapping missions eg
Oested, CHAMP

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Induction Magnetometers

Faraday induction law → Vi = dΦ / dt

... = d (BA) / dt Since B = μoμrH
Vi = d (NAμoμr (t )H (t ) / dt )

Expanded
Vi = NAμoμrdH (t ) / dt + NμoμrHdA(t ) / dt + NAμoHdμr (t ) / dt

Search Coil Rotating coil Fluxgate

MGMs MGMs MGMs

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Anatomy of a Fluxgate
• Operating Principle
– Soft permeable core driven around hysterisis loop
– HEXT results in a net changing flux
– Field proportional voltage induced in sense
winding
– Closed loop improves linearity

• Advantages
– Low noise ~ 20pT/ √Hz @1Hz
– Wide dynamic range
– Mature technology
– Relatively inexpensive

• Disadvantages
– Sensor mass
– Sensor offset
– Power ~ 1W
– In-flight calibration overhead

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 B CASE A
C1

C2
HD

Drive (f0)

CASE A: Zero external DC field B Φ CASE B

Half cores saturate synchronously – no net
change of flux seen by sense wining

CASE B: Non-zero external DC field H

Half cores do not saturate synchronously – a
net change of flux seen by sense wining
Vi 2f0
Change of flux in sense winding at the 4 HD
crossing of the B-H infection points in each
drive period Æ induced voltage at
2 x fo according to Faraday

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Fluxgate Control Electronics: Open Loop

Field magnitude determined

by 2f magnitude Measured 2f
Reference 2f
Field direction determined by
2f phase relative to reference

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Fluxgate Control Electronics: Closed Loop

Benefits include improved linearity and temperature stability. Scale factor depends
only on feedback resistor/gain stage and coil constant.

Considerable effort spent minimising even harmonics in drive signal

some odd harmonics due to transformer effect.

Includes anti-aliasing filter

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 (Magnes 1999)

Measured signal

Feedback signal

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Equating terms and re-arranging

And if kSFLG2G1 >> 1

Two conclusions
Measurement range only set by feedback circuit
Output noise is dominated by input amplifier and sensor noise only
(Very low noise analogue pre-amps available)

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Fluxgate Noise

• Best expressed as a Noise Spectral Density (NSD) often at1Hz

• Characteristic typically has a 1/f fall off

• Between 0 and Nyquist can

use following expression to
calculate RMS Noise

• Above Nyquist noise will be

flat (ie white noise) due to
ADC quantization

• Best quality fluxgates have

NSD ~5pT/Root Hz at 1Hz
Ripka (1998)

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Imperial fluxgate instrument performance
– Industrial partner - Ultra Electronics
– Cassini/Double Star Heritage
– Two core sensor
– Tuned second harmonic detection
– Dual sense and feedback windings
– Offset stability < 0.05 nT/°C
– Scale factor drift < 40 ppm/°C
– Noise density < 8pT/root Hz @1Hz
– Operating range
• -80oC to 70oC (operational)
• -130oC to 90oC (non-operational)

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Importance of ADC: Quantization Noise
– Large number of bits N
– Ideal linearity
– No missing codes
– Radiation tolerance
– Ideal quantization noise

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Quantization Noise
– Large N Rad-tolerant ADCs are a ‘big’ problem for all instruments
– Solution: MIL-STD devices with spot shields (N ~14)
– Traditionally a separate self contained card – Cluster, Rosetta, Cassini
– Use oversampling to reduce Q noise
– Q noise should be matched to intrinsic sensor noise based on desired
range, resolution sensor scale factor and N and LSB

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Digital Magnetometers
– Means migrating control loop into digital domain
– ADC and DAC utilised within sensor control loop
– Offers increased flexibility - programmable
– First Missions late 90s - ROMAP, VEX, Astrid, Oersted
– Shown to reduce analogue content and power consumption
– Numerous designs – still being played out - a very active field
V to I
converter
A digital fluxgate
control loop
ADSP 21262 Ex-Kit Eval. Board

Sense
winding
ADC Field DAC
48/96kHz Correlation Σ
Integrator 6kHz
Sensor (AD1835) (ADSP-21262) (AD1835)
core

Drive
winding

Drive Serial link to

48kHz PC 22Hz
f (12kHz) circuitry

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Delta Sigma Fluxgates – A hot topic

– Single bit quantization at very high frequency– linear by definition

– Tracks changes in consecutive samples rather than absolute value
– ‘Ones’ density of the 1 bit data stream provides an average value of Vin
– Can be implemented with a rad-hard analogue discretes and rad-hard
digital logic – mixed signal ASIC
– Additional gain due to noise shaping
– Eliminates need for old fashioned non rad-hard ADCs

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Noise shaping effect

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 Delta-Sigma Magnetometer

O’Brien (2007)

Replace

+ + with

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 Anisotropic Magnetoresistance

• Magneto Resistance Effect

– Change of resistance in magnetic field
– AMR single layer permalloy, R = R + ΔR cos2 (θ(H ))
– AMR ΔR/Rmin of order 1- 2% 0 0
– AMR has lowest noise floor
– Johnson noise limited - no shot noise

• Barber Poles
– Max, sensitivity & linearity at M v H 45o
– Conductive strips for linear operation

• AMR Sensors
– Thin film solid state devices
– Implemented as Wheatstone bridge
– Mass <1g, Ceramic package
– Sensitivity increases with increasing
bridge voltage, VB

Philips

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Integrated coils

• Set - Reset Coils

– Planar coils around each bridge resistor
– Coil axis parallel to Easy axis
– Used to re-align the anisotropic direction
– Large current spike needed
– Can extract sensor offset (unlike fluxgate)
– Requires de-modulation to DC
– Compensates for offset and offset drift
– Improves sensor noise floor

• Offset coils
– Integrated coils around the bridge
– Coil axis parallel to Hard (sensitive) axis
– Permits electromagnetic feedback
– Used in closed loop back off measured field
– Improves linearity and variation of sensitivity with
temperature
– Suppresses Barkhausen noise

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Single axis AMR magnetometer

• Analog build
• Set-Rest 4A with 2μs τC
• Sensitivity proportional to VB
• Closed loop

RFB
Vo = H y ×
ACOIL

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Stimulus measurement – Fluxgate vs AMR
DSP (20mV/div scale)

• Three layer Mu-Metal shield

• 3Hz sine wave – 5nT ptp
• Optimal AMR configuration
• Closed loop, RFB=9kΩ
• Bridge voltage 12V
• Offset compensation
• Flip frequency, 1.1kHz
• Sensitivity ~ 11mV/nT
• Sensitivity not linear with
AMR increasing RFB
(20mV/div
scale) • Some residual offset in
closed lop
• Temperature measurement
outstanding

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Calibration equation for a vector magnetometer
• Calibration Matrix 12 paramaters needed to transform measured volts to accurate
field components into a physically useful co-ordinate system eg GSE, GSM

– Calibration Matrix
• Sensor gains – convert from raw volts to nT
• Sensor mis-alignments – correct from deviation from nominal sensor axis
• Euler angles –transform othogonalised components into required system

– Offset vector:
• Sensor offset - correct for zero level readings (due to sensor, electronics or S/C)

– Calibration Files
• Text files with calibration matrix & offset vector for each sensor on a daily or
orbit basis :

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Imperial’s Magnetic Coil Facility
Pit for long terms offset and noise
3 axis Helmholtz Coils measurement

Sensor thermal chamber

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Sensor under test

•Facility dynamically backs of Earth’s field using

•Two Earth Field Reference
Magnetometers (EFR) located either side
of the hut

•EFR located in pits either side of test hut

•Sum (average) of EFRs used to cancel Earths
field inside coil system

•Difference (gradient) of EFRs used for

monitoring

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 Practical calibration models
• Ground Calibration - we determine
– Sensor calibration parameters on ground,
– Their associated temperature coefficients,
– Their variations with input power
– The sensor noise

• Magnetic Cleanliness Program - includes

– Maximum length boom
– Low field requirement at boom tip
– Magnetic screening of materials and units OB IB
– A spacecraft magnetic model
– System level magnetic test

• In-flight
– range switching, calibration steps
– In-flight calibration techniques
– Use of multiple sensors
– Use of absolute and vector sensors
– Use of dual-gradiometer modes

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System Level Magnetic Test: Cluster Example

Cluster had a very rigorous (and

expensive) magnetic cleanliness
program

A S/C magnetic field of < 0.25nT is

almost NOT the case on the vast
majority of S/C

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 In-flight calibration techniques
• Spin stabalised spacecraft
– Fourier analysis on spinning data
– Permits recovery of 8 of the 12 cal parameters
– Major error – spin axis offset
– Residual spin tone indicates calibration error
– Example Missions:
• Cluster, Ulysses, Double Star, Equator-S, Themis

• Three-axis stabalised spacecraft

– More difficult to calibrate
– Utilise S/C rolls for offset measurement
– Statistical analyses of solar wind data
– Looks for correlations between B and B components
– Additional absolute reference magnetometer useful
– Example Missions
• Cassini, Rosetta, Oersted, Venus Express

• Multiple spacecraft missions = multiple calibration references

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Multi-S/C Calibration – Cluster Example

Courtesy J. Gloag

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Dual Magnetometer Mode
– Used in cases where S/C field
contaminates measurement
– IB and OB sensor used as a
gradiometer
– Ambient field same at both IB & OB Mod.dip. field
– S/C field NOT same at IB & OB
– Number of sensors is proportional Obs. field
to multipole moment that may be
extracted
– Two sensors limit model to a dipole
of fixed position
– Other techniques utilising pattern Real ambient field
recognition in operation
– Relative sampling of both sensors
important especially on spinning
S/C Figure courtesy Delva
– Usually results in reduced data Example (1 dim.): Solution 1: Solution 2:
rates Real Bam=10 nT p~ = - 20cm
– Example missions: Double Star, p~ =+20cm
Venus Express Real SC dipole: m~=594mA2 m~=229mAm2
p =25 cm
m =200 mAm2 Bam~=6.31nT Bam~=9.6nT

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Case Study. Double Star magnetometer
• OB sensor 5m, IB sensor 3.5m
• Spin synchronised disturbance due to unbalanced solar array current
• Amplitude varies with S/C shunting mode
• Data cleaned using gradiometer mode
• Resulting data set is spin averaged resolution (0.25Hz) compared to 11Hz on-board

Un-cleaned data and shunting modes Un-cleaned and cleaned data

Carr (2005)

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 A new magnetometer model?

• Fluxgate - AMR combination

• Single fluxgate at end of a (shorter boom)
• Several AMR sensors inward of the fluxgate Short boom
• Permits multipole expansion of S/C field
• Accurate separation ambient field at instrument
intrinsic data rate S/C

• Precise tracking of fluxgate offsets

• Required for space plasma constellations
AMR Fluxgate
• Potential for automation sensors sensor
• Could be applied acoss missions
• Extendable to an array of AMR sensors

Question – How to validate concept ?

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A magnetometer array
• Imperial College student satellite program
– Milestone - Two spacecraft in LEO
– 10cm cube, 1kg modules
– Injection into LEO approx $30,000

• Aims
– Measure ULF wave field in dayside
magnetosphere
– Flight qualify FPGA controlled AMR array
– Validate S/C field rejection algorithms
– Extract accurate magnetic field vector

• Ground validation
– Mobile Coil Facility
– ESTEC MDM to calculate E-box moments
– Measure both S/C components and
assembled S/C Image courtesy of C. Howell

– Measured moments fitted to S/C model

– Permits validation test of field rejection on
ground

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 Potential Flight Opportunity 2010

CINEMA- CubeSat for measurement of ions, neutrals and

magnetic fields

• Collaboration between UCB, IC & NASA AMES

• Space plasma science measurement on 3U CubeSat
• Led by UCB/SSL
• LEO with >65o inclination (72o nominal), 650km
•1m deployable boom
• Spin stabalised at ~1rpm
• Two MAG sensors
• Submitted to NSF Space Weather Competition 2008
• To be re-submitted 2009
• Heritage: GeneSat & STEREO

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 CINEMA Magnetometer
1m extendable boom
Boom mass ~120g
MAG orientation not controlled
Determined by magneto-torquer pulse
post deployment
Following de-tumble CubeSat spun up
1m boom and spin axis aligned normal to ecliptic

Magnetometer
MAGIC Magnetometer Modes
Attitude Mode
Accuracy <25nT, <150mW
Science Mode
Accuracy <2nT, <750mW
Instrument Range +/-65536nT
Resolution: 0.25nT
MAG Boom Harness
MAGIC Sensor head

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