Electrostatic Regolith Interaction Experiment (ERIE) Suborbital Flight and Testing

The Electrostatic Regolith Interaction Experiment (ERIE) is a suborbital flight payload studying electrostatically charged dust particle dynamics under microgravity, with the goal of informing both scientific and technological applications for lunar and planetary exploration. Jointly developed by University of Central Florida (UCF) and NASA Kennedy Space Center (KSC), ERIE combines components from two systems, the COLLisions Into Dust Experiment (COLLIDE, UCF) and the Wheel Electrostatic Spectrometer (WES, NASA KSC), to advance understanding of charged grain behavior on low gravity bodies such as the Moon and asteroids. The overall experiment design was built off of the existing COLLIDE design, components of which have heritage from a flight on a Space Shuttle payload, and which had previously flown on suborbital flight experiments. To measure charged particle and surface interactions, we integrated an updated design of the WES into a door that slides over a bed of regolith. We also observe the behavior of the tribo-charged particles in microgravity. We have previously reported on the design and initial results from the electrometer instrument. In this presentation we will discuss more of the observations of dust grain dynamics, comparisons with ground-based studies, and the system adaptation for and performance on the suborbital flights. We also discuss implications for adaption for instrumentation and measurements on the lunar surface.