During a session with the Deep Space Network on Friday the DS1 team was able to download a large block of science data previously acquired last year of Mars.

Dr Marc Rayman deputy mission manager for DS1 told SpaceDaily that the workaround to manage spacecraft attitude would be repeated next week during the mission's weekly DSN session allocated for the extended mission.

Since December 15, the DS1 team has been implementing an innovative method that salvages the extended mission's science component and ensures DS1 will be able to perform a flyby of comet Borrelly in September 2001.

The problems for DS1 began November 11 when the spacecraft's star tracker stopped functioning.

The star tracker helps determine the spacecraft's orientation, and although not one of the 12 technologies tested during DS1's primary mission, it is a new and sophisticated device said Rayman.

"The star tracker is not part of the navigation system but rather the attitude control system. Among its many responsibilities, the attitude control system determines how the spacecraft is oriented when firing the engines or pointing the science camera," Rayman added.

Since the breakdown of the star tracker, the spacecraft has been in a safe mode using its Sun sensor to point its main antenna and solar arrays at the Sun and rotating once per hour.

Deep Space One has been one of NASA's most successful faster, cheaper better missions and was used to validate 12 new technologies that will have wide spread application in future FBC missions.

Deep Space 1: Rocketing to the Future

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Satellite Launch To Boost DTH In India
Calcutta, India (SPX) Dec 28, 2005
The successful launch Thursday of India's heaviest satellite from spaceport of Kourou in French Guyana may have boosted the country's space research efforts to yet another level, but it has also lifted the spirits of at least three Direct-To-Home televisions broadcasters, one of which has been waiting for years to launch its services in India.