NASA engineers have installed a highly sensitive antenna on the Europa Clipper spacecraft, which will set out to explore Jupiter’s icy moon Europa in late 2024. The antenna, which is about 3 meters in diameter, will be used to transmit scientific data and receive commands from Earth hundreds of millions of kilometers away.

Europa Clipper is the largest space probe NASA has created to study planets. Its mission is to unlock Europe’s potential for living conditions. The spacecraft will make approximately 50 flybys of the satellite to collect data on its atmosphere, ice crust and subglacial ocean with the help of nine scientific instruments.

This antenna and several smaller antennas will transmit data to Earth. The signal will reach our planet in approximately 45 minutes from the moment of liftoff, when the spacecraft will enter Jupiter’s orbit. To provide the required bandwidth, the antenna will operate on the X-band (7.2 and 8.4 GHz) and Ka-band (32 GHz) radio frequencies of NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN). The DSN is a global network of large radio antennas that communicate with dozens of spacecraft in the solar system.

Installation of the highly sensitive antenna was a major milestone in Europa Clipper’s preparation for the mission. Engineers will now continue testing the spacecraft and perform final checks before launch. Europa Clipper will be launched from Kennedy Space Center 39A on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket before October 2024.

Europa Clipper’s antenna was developed by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) and AASC (Applied Aerospace Structures Corporation). The mission is managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in collaboration with NASA’s APL. The spacecraft’s main body was designed by APL in partnership with JPL and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.