LISA Technology Package System Design And Operations

An overview of the current status of the LISA Technology Package (LTP) on‐board the LISA Pathfinder spacecraft is presented. There are several major challenges with the development of the LTP: the development of the hardware compliant with severe performance requirements, of the software for the subsystems and of the experiment software that controls the subsystems. A status report of the instrument hardware is given at first and some critical issues are addressed. Then, the operational interconnection among subsystems, control software and experiment software is explained through three major operational procedures: de‐caging and release of the test masses, acquisition of the optical metrology, and charge measurement/control.