Spacecraft design impacts on the post-Newtonian parameter estimation

The ESA mission BepiColombo, reaching out to explore the elusive planet Mercury, features unprecedented tracking techniques. The highly precise orbit determination around Mercury is a compelling opportunity for a modern test of General Relativity (GR). Using the software tool GRETCHEN incorporating the Square Root Information Filter (SRIF), MPO´s orbit is simulated and the post-Newtonian parameters (PNP) are estimated. In this work, the influence of a specific constraint of the Mercury Orbiter Radio science Experiment (MORE) on the achievable accuracy of the PNP estimates is investigated. The power system design of the spacecraft requires that ±35° around perihelion the Ka transponder needs to be switched off, thus radiometric data is only gathered via X band. This analysis shows the impact of this constraint on the achievable accuracy of PNP estimates. On a bigger scale, if GR shows some violation at a detectable level it inevitably leads to its invalidation.