Ariel, the Atmospheric remote-sensing infrared exoplanet large-survey mission, addresses one of the key themes of ESA’s Cosmic Vision program: What are the conditions for planet formation and the emergence of life? Ariel will study what exoplanets are made of, how they formed, and how they evolve, by surveying a diverse sample of around 1000 planetary atmospheres simultaneously in visible and infrared wavelengths.
It is the first mission dedicated to measuring exoplanets' chemical composition and thermal structures, linking them to the host star’s environment. This will fill a significant gap in our knowledge of how the planet’s chemistry is linked to the environment where it formed, or whether the type of host star drives the physics and chemistry of the planet’s evolution.
Observations of these worlds will give insights into the early stages of planetary and atmospheric formation, and their subsequent evolution, in the process, also helping us to understand how our own Solar System fits into the bigger picture of the overall cosmos.
ALTER is already supporting all payload members in the selection, procurement and testing activities on the technologies that will be used in the ARIEL payload, under direct contract with ESA. Our current ARIEL participation was recently extended, this time under direct contract with the ARIEL Prime Contractor, Airbus Toulouse, to carry out Product Assurance tasks in 3 disciplines: Components (EEE), QA and Materials and Processes for a wide selection of platform equipment manufacturers.