Monitoring of the High-Energy Radiation Environment of Exoplanets around Low-mass Stars with SPARCS (Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat): Launch, Operations, and Science

Roughly 50 billion low-mass stars in the Milky Way host at least one small planet in the habitable zone (HZ). The stellar ultraviolet (UV) radiation upon the planets from their low-mass stellar hosts is strong and highly variable and impacts the planet's atmospheric loss, composition, and habitability. These effects are amplified by the extreme proximity of their HZs (0.1 - 0.4 AU). The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO), and up-coming extremely large ground-based telescopes aim to characterize HZ K and M dwarf planets and attempt the first spectroscopic search for life beyond the Solar System. Knowing the UV environments of planets around low-mass stars is crucial to understanding their atmospheric composition and a key parameter in discriminating between biological and abiotic sources of observed biosignatures. The NASA/APRA-funded CubeSat observatory, the Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat (SPARCS), is the first mission to provide the time-dependent spectral slope, intensity, and evolution of the UV radiation from low-mass stars, including the strongest and rarest flares. As demonstrated by planet atmosphere models, these measurements are necessary to interpret observations of planets around low-mass stars. For this, we must extend the UV time-domain knowledge from timescales of hours to months. A dedicated monitoring experiment, such as SPARCS, is the only way to achieve this. SPARCS is a 6U CubeSat devoted to monitoring 20 low-mass stars in two UV bands: SPARCS far-UV (S-FUV: 153 -171 nm) and SPARCS near-UV (S-NUV: 260 - 300 nm). For each target, SPARCS observes continuously between one and three complete stellar rotations (5 - 40 days) over a mission lifetime of one year, providing three orders of magnitude increase in NUV and FUV measurements of low-mass stars over all UV data collected with HST and GALEX. The three science and technological objectives for the SPARCS program are: (1) Quiescent low-mass Measurements: Measure the short- (min.) and long-term (weeks) variability and time-integrated absolute flux of young and old K and M stars in the NUV and FUV. (2) Flare Measurements: Measure flare color, energy, frequency, and duration of flares states for young and old low-mass stars in the NUV and FUV. (3) Technology Demonstrations of UV delta-doped detectors and detector-integrated metal dielectric filters (MDF) in an operational environment: SPARCS is the mission to bring these innovations to orbit. SPARCS' Status: Thanks to NASA/APRA support, the SPARCS mission development is near completion and will be ready for an identified launch opportunity in early 2025. The JPL-developed/built camera was recently delivered to ASU where it is now being paired with the telescope (payload assembly integration and testing; PL AIT) in the laboratory specifically designed for the contamination control environment required for the FUV. Soon, the spacecraft (S/C) bus will arrive and PL+S/C bus AIT will be completed. This proposal aims to secure funds for final preparations for launch, in-orbit operations, data analysis, dissemination of technical and science results, data archiving, and mission close-out. SPARCS science directly addresses NASA's goals of identifying the characteristics and the distribution of potentially habitable environments. The observations will be used to develop a viable target strategy for larger observatories (e.g., JWST, HWO), and prepare for the interpretation of transmission and emission spectra of potentially habitable planets. The SPARCS mission will also further NASA's plans of achieving high-impact astrophysical research with smallsats and technology advancement for future UV-optimized space telescopes, including two existing Explorer-level concepts and the HWO. In addition, the SPARCS team is training future mission leaders as graduate students and early-career researchers are involved in all aspects of the mission.

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