; de430s.bsp LOG FILE ; Created 2013-12-09/17:43:19.56. ; ; BEGIN SPKMERGE COMMANDS LEAPSECONDS_KERNEL = /ftp/pub/naif/generic_kernels/lsk/naif0010.tls SPK_KERNEL = de430s.bsp SOURCE_SPK_KERNEL = /ftp/pub/naif/generic_kernels/spk/planets/de430.bsp INCLUDE_COMMENTS = YES BODIES = 299, 199, 399, 301, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 BEGIN_TIME = 1994 DEC 31 23:58:58.816 END_TIME = 2034 DEC 31 23:58:52.816 ; END SPKMERGE COMMANDS September 03, 2013 C. Acton JPL's Solar System Dynamics Group has released two new planetary/lunar ephemerides, named DE430 and DE431. DE430 is now considered the official export lunar/planetary ephemeris, suitable for all users/uses. It's approximate time span is 1550 JAN 01 to 2650 JAN 22. If a longer time span is needed, DE431 may be used, except that the lunar ephemeris portion is of relatively poor accuracy outside of the time span covered by DE430. The time span covered by DE431 is approximately 13202 B.C. to 17191 A.D. Because de431 is so long, leading to a huge file, it has been split into two parts having the approximagte time spans of: 13202 B.C. to 0 0 to 17191 A.D. More details about these ephemeris files are contained in accompanying documentation available on the NAIF server: http://naif.jpl.nasa.gov/pub/naif/generic_kernels/spk/planets/ Special note regarding Mars: starting with this DE file the location of Mars' mass center (NAIF ID = 499) is *NOT* included; only the Mars system barycenter (ID = 4) is present. The offset between Mars' mass center and the Mars' system barycenter in DE403 is quite small --about 20 cm.--so most SPICE users could use the Mars system barycenter in place of the Mars mass center. However, if you wish/need to have the Mars mass center available to your program, you'll need to load a Mars satellite ephemeris file such as "mar097.bsp" in addition to DE430. Satellite ephemeris files are available from the NAIF server here: http://naif.jpl.nasa.gov/pub/naif/generic_kernels/spk/satellites/ Details about SPICE planet and satellite ephemeris files, known as SPK files, including how to read them using SPICE Toolkit software, may be found in the SPK tutorial (PDF file name is "19_spk") available from the NAIF website (http://naif.jpl.nasa.gov/tutorials.html). BRIEF -- Version 3.0.0, January 14, 2008 -- Toolkit Version N0064 Summary for: de430s.bsp Bodies Start of Interval (ET) End of Interval (ET) ------- ----------------------------- ----------------------------- 1 MERCURY BARYCENTER 1995 JAN 01 00:00:00.000 2035 JAN 01 00:00:00.000 2 VENUS BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 3 EARTH BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 4 MARS BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 5 JUPITER BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 6 SATURN BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 7 URANUS BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 8 NEPTUNE BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 9 PLUTO BARYCENTER Same coverage as previous object 10 SUN Same coverage as previous object 199 MERCURY Same coverage as previous object 299 VENUS Same coverage as previous object 301 MOON Same coverage as previous object 399 EARTH Same coverage as previous object