HERMES SOC activities at the ASI space science data center (SSDC)

The High Energy Rapid Modular Ensemble of Satellites (HERMES) mission concept implements an all-sky monitor to capture bright high-energy transients such as Gamma-Ray Bursts candidate electromagnetic counterparts of gravitational wave signals, as in the case of the GRB170817A event. HERMES Pathfinder is a constellation of six 3U nanosatellites funded primarily by the Italian Space Agency, with support from the European Union Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme, aiming to demonstrate the mission feasibility. The six satellites will be deployed in low Earth orbit and host simple but innovative detectors, sensitive to X-rays and soft g-rays from ∼2 keV to ∼1–2 MeV and with a high temporal resolution of the order of 300 ns. HERMES will locate Gamma-Ray Bursts by measuring the delays between the arrival times of their signals on at least three satellites and will allow the time structure of these cosmological objects to be studied for the first time down to a few μs, in order to constrain their engine models. The mini constellation will be launched in the first half of 2025, but since 1 December 2023 the first HERMES payload has been flying in a Sun-synchronous low Earth orbit on board the Australian SpIRIT mission. The HERMES Science Operation Center is hosted by the ASI Space Science Data Center, which is responsible for the processing, validation and distribution of scientific and ancillary data, for quick-look analysis, mission planning, Gamma-Ray Burst trigger alerts, calibration data and data-analysis software development.