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Paper: Modelling of Zodiacal Light Emission for Space Missions
Volume: 521, Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems XXVI
Page: 531
Authors: Maris, M.; Scaramella, R.; Burigana, C.; Romelli, E.; Amiaux, J.; Carvalho, C. S.; Cuillandre, J. C.; Da Silva, A.; De Rosa, A.; Dinis, J.; Hudelot, P.; Maiorano, E.; Tereno, I.; Trombetti, T.
Abstract: Accurate planning of forthcoming missions requires an accurate knowledge of diffuse sources in order to optimize mission parameters and the scanning strategy. Zodiacal Light (ZL or Zody) is a well known contaminant for ground based and space-borne observations and contributes to determine the limit magnitude of a survey. Despite the physical origin of ZL is well known, predicting and modeling Zody contamination is complicated by a number of subtleties. The cloud of Interplanetary Dust Particles has a quite complex 3D structure, whose main geometrical parameters have been assessed in the last two decades, but their photometrical properties are affected by a significant level of uncertainty. The observer orbiting the Sun is moving within the cloud of IDPs, leading to an important time dependence in the perturbing signal and asking for a precise knowledge of the expected trajectory and scanning strategy of the mission. This work illustrates this problem taking the ESA Euclid mission as a case study and presenting the Zody EUclid Simulator (ZEUS) developed for this mission.
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