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On-ground testing of the role of adhesion in the LISA-Pathfinder test mass injection phase

Bortoluzzi, D.; Zanoni, C.; Conklin, J. W.

Many space missions share the need to fly a free-falling body inside the spacecraft, as a reference for navigation and/or as a probe for the local gravitational field. When a mechanism is required to cage such an object during the launch phase, the need arises to release it to free-fall once the operational phase must be initiated in orbit. The cr…