The Rosetta UV Spectrometer

Alice UVS in the Lab

Alice is a compact, general-purpose UV imaging telescope/spectrometer, which is now flying aboard the ESA/NASA Rosetta asteroid flyby/comet rendezvous mission and on NASA's New Horizons mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt. The two Alices are called ``R-Alice'' and ``P-Alice'' (as part of the Persi suite on New Horizons).

A ``spectrometer'' is an instrument that separates light into its constituent wavelengths, like a prism, only better. An ``imaging spectrometer'' both separates the different wavelengths of light and produces an image of the target at each wavelength. The R-Alice experiment is aimed primarily at studying the gases released from the nucleus of comet 67 P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in order to help understand the origin of our solar system.

At This Site

General Information

Background information on the Alice experiment and comet 67 P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

Technical Information

Technical details about the spacecraft, instrument and science mission planning, for scientists and engineers

Science Team Area

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Rosetta spacecraft photos

For more information about the Alice instrument, see:

• ESA's Alice page
• Alice -- An Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrometer for the Rosetta Orbiter (PostScript paper)