After years of development, manufacturing and integration the eROSITA mission was launched from Baikonur on July 13th on-board of the Russian-German “Spectrum-Roentgen-Gamma” (SRG) spacecraft. Leaving Earth behind, eROSITA will travel to the second Lagrange point (L2) of the Sun-Earth system at a distance of about 1.5 million kilometers to scan the entire sky with unprecedented sensitivity. It will detect more than 100,000 of the most massive bound objects in the Universe, millions of active black holes at the centers of galaxies, as well as rare objects in the Milky Way, such as isolated neutron stars. The mission will thus provide valuable information about the mysterious "Dark Energy", the force behind the accelerated expansion of the Universe.
Seven mirror modules with fifty-four mirror shells each and seven uniquely designed and built X-ray cameras were mounted in INVENT’s high-precision telescope structure. In subcontract to Max Planck Institute MPE INVENT has supported the design, performed several qualification activities and manufactured the entire structure of the instrument consisting of CFRP sandwich panels, aluminum radiators, monolithic CFRP parts, filament wound CFRP and GFRP struts and metallic components. Together with many others, e.g. HPS (supplied MLI), this mission had a significant contribution of Germany’s space SMEs.
Seven mirror modules with fifty-four mirror shells each and seven uniquely designed and built X-ray cameras were mounted in INVENT’s high-precision telescope structure. In subcontract to Max Planck Institute MPE INVENT has supported the design, performed several qualification activities and manufactured the entire structure of the instrument consisting of CFRP sandwich panels, aluminum radiators, monolithic CFRP parts, filament wound CFRP and GFRP struts and metallic components. Together with many others, e.g. HPS (supplied MLI), this mission had a significant contribution of Germany’s space SMEs.
