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The Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) is one of four scientific instruments on the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) observatory, scheduled for launch in 2014. It will provide unique capabilities to probe the deeply dust-enshrouded regions of the Universe, investigating the history of star formation both near and far. The MIRI is the coldest instrument on the observatory. Its thermal design is driven by requirements to cool an Optics Module (OM) to below 15.5 K and detectors within this to below 6.7 K with a stability of <10 mK over 1000 seconds. The OM is accommodated within the JWST Integrated Science instrument Module (ISIM) which is cooled passively to between 32 and 40 K. The instrument temperatures are achieved by a combination of thermal isolation of the OM and the ISIM supplemented with active cooling of the OM by a dedicated cryo-cooler.

The Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) is one of four scientific instruments on the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) observatory, scheduled for launch in 2013. It will provide unique capabilities to probe the distant or deeply dust-enshrouded regions of the Universe, investigating the history of star formation both near and far. The MIRI is the coldest instrument on the observatory. Its thermal design is driven by requirements to cool its Optics Module (OM) to below 15.5 K and detectors within this to below 6.7 K. The MIRI OM is accommodated within the JWST Integrated Science Instrument Module (ISIM) which is cooled passively to between 32 and 40 K. The instrument temperatures are achieved by a combination of thermal isolation of the OM from the ISIM supplemented with active cooling of the OM by a dedicated cryocooler.

The ESA Solar Orbiter is planned for launch in the 2013 to 2015 time frame and aims to study the Sun in unprecedented detail. The Extreme Ultra Violet Spectrometer (EUS) Instrument will provide plasma diagnostic observations of solar plasmas over a broad temperature range from chromosphere to corona for the study of all solar atmospheric phenomena. In broad terms, the instrument comprises a telescope and a spectrometer, the latter containing detector units that must be cooled to about −80 °C. The Solar Orbiter will be inserted into an approximately 150 day solar orbit with an aphelion of about 0.8 Astronomical Units (AU) and a perihelion of about 0.2 AU. Instrument observations are likely to occur for about 30 days centered on perihelion. During the Cruise phase the spacecraft will be as far as 1.2 AU from the Sun. The nominal operational mission is almost three years (about seven orbits), with potentially an extended mission of a further two or three years.

Beagle 2 was a British-led mission to place a scientific Lander on Mars to search specifically for evidence of past or present life and to conduct geochemical and environmental investigations. It was launched aboard the European Space Agency’s Mars Express on 2nd June 2003 and was scheduled to land in the Isidis Planitia region of Mars in late December 2003. The 33 kg Beagle 2 Lander had to be designed to survive the extreme thermal environment of Mars, where temperatures can fall to around −100 °C overnight. Critically, the on-board battery could not fall below −30 °C and overnight heater usage needed to be minimized to conserve battery energy. One novelty was that a thermal design was developed that did not require radioisotope heater units. This paper describes the development and evolution of the Beagle 2 thermal control sub-system.