An overview of the electrical, electronic and on-board data handling architecture of the Ariel Payload

Ariel, the Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey mission [1], [2], has been selected by ESA in March 2018 and adopted in November 2020 by the Agency for the fourth medium-class mission (M4) launch opportunity of the Cosmic Vision Program, scheduled in 2029. It is the first survey mission dedicated to measuring the chemical composition and thermal structures of the atmospheres of hundreds of transiting exoplanets, in order to enable planetary science far beyond the boundaries of our own Solar System. The Payload (P/L) and its electrical, electronic and data handling architecture, scope of this digest, has been designed and optimized to perform transit spectroscopy from space during primary and secondary planetary eclipses in order to achieve a large set of unbiased observations related to the nature of exoplanets atmospheres, retrieving information about planets interior and determining the key factors affecting the formation and evolution of planetary systems.