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    AMPTE (Active Magnetosphere Particle Tracer Explorer)

    AMPTE-CCE
    AMPTE-CCE
    An international mission to create an artificial comet, in the form of a plasma cloud, and observe its interaction with the solar wind. It involved the simultaneous launch, on Aug. 16, 1984, by a Delta 3925 rocket from Cape Canaveral, of three cooperating spacecraft into highly elliptical orbits.

    The German component (IRM, or Ion Release Module) released a cloud of barium and lithium ions to produce the "comet", the American component (CCE, or Charge Composition Explorer) studied its resultant behavior, and the British component (UKS, or United Kingdom Satellite) measured the effects of the cloud on natural plasma in space.

    This was first the time a plasma cloud was released by a spacecraft. In the future, it has been suggested, manned spacecraft might use contained plasma bubbles as a form of deflector shield.


    Spacecraft Nation Orbit Mass (kg)
    AMPTE-1 (CCE) United States 1,121 × 49,671 km × 4.8° 242
    AMPTE-2 (UKS) United Kingdom 402 × 113,818 km × 27.0° 605
    AMPTE-3 (IRM) West Germany 1,002 × 114,417 km × 26.9° 77


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