The MAGnetometers for Innovation and Capability (MAGIC) Technology Demonstration Payload.

Area of Science:

• Space Physics
• Instrument Technology
• Magnetometry

Background:

• The supply of legacy Infinetics S1000 fluxgate magnetometer cores is diminishing, impacting future spaceflight missions.
• New fluxgate magnetometer cores are needed to ensure continued in-situ magnetic field measurements in space.

Purpose of the Study:

• To flight-demonstrate novel low-noise fluxgate magnetometer cores developed at the University of Iowa.
• To validate the performance of new fluxgate core designs against existing technologies in a space environment.

Main Methods:

• The MAGnetometers for Innovation and Capability (MAGIC) instruments were integrated onto the Tandem Reconnection And Cusp Electrodynamics Reconnaissance Satellites (TRACERS) mission.
• Two distinct sensor designs were flown: one with a backward-compatible 1" ring-core and another featuring a novel Tesseract race-track geometry core.
• Technology demonstration magnetometers were mounted alongside science magnetometers for direct in-flight comparison and validation.

Main Results:

• The MAGIC instruments successfully flight-demonstrated new fluxgate magnetometer core technologies.
• In-flight validation of the new cores was performed by direct comparison with TRACERS science magnetometers.
• The Tesseract sensor design, utilizing race-track geometry cores, was introduced and tested.

Conclusions:

• The new low-noise fluxgate magnetometer cores are suitable for spaceflight applications.
• The MAGIC instruments provide a viable path for replacing legacy magnetometer cores.
• The TRACERS mission successfully validated advanced magnetometry technology for future space exploration.