NASA's HEliophysics Strategic Technology Office (HESTO) has selected Prof. David Miles from the University of Iowa and Prof. Wojciech Miloch of the University of Oslo to provide a fluxgate magnetometer for the upcoming Norwegian ICI-5bis sounding rocket mission. 

This mission will launch in November 2025 from the Andøya Space Sub-Orbital Range in Norway. ICI-5bis will study plasma turbulence and irregularities in the auroral ionosphere as a contribution to the international Grand Challenge Initiative – MLT (Mesosphere-Lower Thermosphere). 

This selection was made for HESTO's new Pathfinder project, which has the goal of helping technologies cross the critical gap between early-stage concepts and flight demonstration. Pathfinder will do this by investing in mature and existing technology projects that have an identified flight opportunity.

In the first Pathfinder, the University of Iowa will flight demonstrate next-generation magnetometer technologies. The new magnetometer incorporates two recent technology improvements. The sensor is based on the ‘Tesseract’ design from the MAGIC technology demonstration that will fly on the TRACERS Small Explorers mission in 2025. In this new and improved version, the sensor has been miniaturized down to “nanosatellite” scale, without sacrificing measurement performance. Referred to as the “Mini-T”, it also uses new electronics developed as part of the CHIMERA project (18-HTIDS18-001), which should allow for more radiation tolerant electronics to support infusion into missions that experience harsh radiation environments. This new sensor could be deployed in a nanosatellite constellation to study the dynamics of Earth’s magnetosphere or deployed into the hostile environment of the Earth’s Van Allen Radiation Belts.