The Cosmic Hot Interstellar Plasma Spectrometer (CHIPS) was a University-Class Explorer (UNEX) mission. The CHIPS program demonstrated that a small (65 kg), three-axis stabilized spacecraft and science instrument could be built and operated for a fraction of the cost of traditional missions. CHIPS launched on January 12, 2003 as a secondary payload aboard the ICESAT Delta-II launch vehicle. Although CHIPS had a design life of only 18 months, it operated successfully for over five years.
