Abstract
Gaia is ESA next-generation astrometric space mission, that will be launched in December 2013. The main objective of Gaia is to produce an astrometric census of one billion objects down to the 20th magnitude. The level of astrometric precision will be around the 10 microarcseconds. In order to achieve such demanding performances, the complexity of the satellite is huge, and a proper fully automated operation must be adopted. One of the essential parts of the satellite is the BAM instrument, an interferometric device with the task of monitoring the variation of the Basic Angle between the two telescope that compose the payload. In this paper we describe the main features of this sub-instrument and its performances.
