×

About

People

Outreach

Science

Data & Tools

Photos

Commissioning

WBD Home

Cluster II Wideband (WBD) Instrument Overview

---

As part of the Cluster Wave Experiment Consortium (WEC), the Wideband (WBD) Plasma Wave Investigation is designed to provide high-resolution measurements of both electric and magnetic fields in selected frequency bands from 25 Hz to 577 kHz. Continuous waveforms are digitized and transmitted in either a 220 kbit/s real-time mode or a 73 kbit/s burst mode. The real-time data are received directly by a NASA Deep-Space Network (DSN) receiving station, and the burst-mode data are transferred to the spacecraft solid-state recorder for later playback. On the ground, the waveforms are examined for evidence of nonlinear and linear signals, and transformed via wavelet transforms for analysis in time and frequency and via Fourier transforms for analysis in frequency space only. The WBD measurements complement those of the other WEC instruments and also provide a unique new capability to perform very-long baseline interferometry (VLBI) measurements.

---