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The Autonomous Sciencecraft Constellation flight demonstration (ASC) will fly onboard the Air Forces's TechSat-21 constellation. Demonstration of its capabilities in a flight environment will open up tremendous new opportunities in planetary science, space physics, and earth science that would be unreadable without this technology.
We overview or recent development and testing of the FIDO rover, an advanced technology prototype for long range mobile planetary science.
In cooperation with NASA's Solar System Exploration Subcommittee and its working groups, JPL is investigating the feasibility of planetary science missions proposed for launch toward the end of the next decade.
Extraterrestrial Intelligence is intelligent life that developed somewhere other than the earth. Such life has not yet been discovered. However, scientific research, including astronomy, biology, planetary science and studies of fossils here on earth have led many scientists to conclude that such life may exist on planets orbiting at least some of the hundreds of billions of stars in our Milky Way Galaxy. Today, some researchers are trying to find evidence for extraterrestrial intelligence. This effort is often called SETI, which stands for Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. SETI researchers decided that looking for evidence of their technology might be the best way to discover other intelligent life in the Galaxy. They decided to use large radio telescopes to search the sky over a wide range of radio frequencies...
The original Cassini mission concept for intensive Saturn exploration included dual atmospheric probes - to Titan and Saturn. The Saturn probe was lost in Cassini Project cost reduction, but the Saturn atmospheric goals are still important to the planetary science community - especially it measurements can be acquired during synoptic coverage by the Cassini Orbiter. New advanced technology and design heritage from the Pluto Fast Flyby mission permit a low cost mission concept for launch early in the first decade of the 21st century, in time to take advantage of the Cassini spacecraft being in orbit around Saturn. This paper will describe such a concept. The mini-probe carrier can be a relatively simple design, depending on a solar array/battery power system design instead of Radioactive Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs) with their attendant programmatic complexities, costs, and constraints. The Atlas IIAS/Star 48B, Proton, and STS with upper stage are launch vehicle options which permit modest payload deliveries to Saturn with relatively short flight times (3 to 4 years) such that the mini-probes arrive in the time period when the Cassini Orbiter is operating at Saturn. The Cassini time-line with a compatible SMP mission sequence is described. An example mission concept includes a carrier spacecraft with three 10 to 20 kg mini-probes, launched in the late summer of 2001 by an Atlas IIAS/Star 48B on a 3.8 year trip to Saturn. Preliminary evaluation of the Cassini time-line suggests compatibility of the probe entries with collecting the data for Earth-return.
Planetary surface mobility has to date been limited to benign locations. If rover systems could be developed for more challenging terrain, e.g., sloped and irregularly feathered areas, then planetary science opportunities would be greatly expanded.
In cooperation with NASA's Solar System Exploration Subcommittee (SSES) the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is conducting a series of studies to assess the feasibility of planetary science missions proposed for launch in the 2006-2010 time frame and to prioritize technology development steps that will enable these missions.
The Saturnian satellite Iapetus presents one of the most unusual appearances of any object in the Solar System: one hemisphere is about 10 times as bright as the other. The origin of the dark hemisphere - which reflects only a few percent of the solar radiation falling on it - is one of the great enigmas of planetary science.
Deep Impact is NASA's eighth Discovery mission. This low-cost, focused planetary science investigation gathered the data necessary to help scientists unlock early secrets of our solar system. The comet encounter with Tempel 1 was a complex event - requiring extremely accurate timing, robustness to an unknown environment, and flight team adaptibility. The mission operations and flight systems performance were spectacular for approach, impact, and lookback imaging on July 4, 2005.
Deep Impact is NASA's eighth Discovery mission. This low-cost, focused planetary science investigation gathered the data necessary to help scientists unlock early secrets of our solar system. The comet encounter with Tempel 1 was a complex event - requiring extremely accurate timing, robutstness to an unknown environment, and flight team adaptability. The mission operations and flight systems performance were spectacular for approach, impact, and lookback imaging on July 4, 2005.
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On-board supervisory execution is crucial for the deployment of more capable and autonomous remote explorers. Planetary science is considering robotic explorers operating for long periods of time without ground supervision while interacting with a changing and often hostile environment. Effective and robust operations require on-board supervisory control with a high level of awareness of the principles of functioning of the environment and of the numerous internal subsystems that need to be coordinated. We describe an on-board rover executive that was deployed on a rover as past of the "Limits of Life in the Atacama Desert (LITA)" field campaign sponsored by the NASA ASTEP program. The executive was built using the Intelligent Distributed Execution Architecture (IDEA), an execution framework that uses model-based and plan-based supervisory control of its fundamental computational paradigm. We present the results of the third field experiment conducted in the Atacama desert (Chile) in August - October 2005.
The Megapixel Mid-infrared Instrument (MegaMIR) is a proposed Fizeau-mode camera for the Large Binocular Telescope operating at wavelengths between 5 and 28 micrometers. The camera will be used in conjunction with the Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer (LBTI), a cryogenic optical system that combines the beams from twin 8.4-m telescopes in a phase coherent manner. Unlike other interferometric systems, the co-mounted telescopes on the LBT satisfy the sine condition, providing diffraction-limited resolution over the 40" field of view of the camera. With a 22.8-m baseline, MegaMIR will yield 0.1" angular resolution, making it the highest resolution wide field imager in the thermal infrared for at least the next decade. MegaMIR will utilize a newly developed 1024 x 1024 pixel Si:As detector array that has been optimized for use at high backgrounds. This new detector is a derivative of the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) low-background detector. The combination of high angular resolution and wide field imaging will be a unique scientific capability for astronomy. Key benefits will be realized in planetary science, galactic, and extra-galactic astronomy. High angular resolution is essential to disentangle highly complex sources, particularly in star formation regions and external galaxies, and MegaMIR provides this performance over a full field of view. Because of the great impact being made by space observatories like the Spitzer Space Telescope, the number of available targets for study has greatly increased in recent years, and MegaMIR will allow efficient follow up science.
The NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) ion propulsion system has been in advanced technology development under the NASA In-Space Propulsion Technology project. The highest fidelity hardware planned has now been completed by the government/industry team, including: a flight prototype model (PM) thruster, an engineering model (EM) power processing unit, EM propellant management assemblies, a breadboard gimbal, and control unit simulators. Subsystem and system level technology validation testing is in progress. To achieve the objective Technology Readiness Level 6, environmental testing is being conducted to qualification levels in ground facilities simulating the space environment. Additional tests have been conducted to characterize the performance range and life capability of the NEXT thruster. This paper presents the status and results of technology validation testing accomplished to date, the validated subsystem and system capabilities, and the plans for completion of this phase of NEXT development. The next round of competed planetary science mission announcements of opportunity, and directed mission decisions, are anticipated to occur in 2008 and 2009. Progress to date, and the success of on-going technology validation, indicate that the NEXT ion propulsion system will be a primary candidate for mission consideration in these upcoming opportunities.
The lifetime of a patterned carbon nanotube film is evaluated for use as the cold cathode field emission ionization source of a miniaturized mass spectrometer. Emitted current is measured as a function of time for varying partial pressures of nitrogen gas to explore the robustness and lifetime of carbon nanotube cathodes near the expected operational voltages (70-100 eV) for efficient ionization in mass spectrometry. As expected, cathode lifetime scales inversely with partial pressure of nitrogen. Results are presented within the context of previous carbon nanotube investigations, and implications for planetary science mass spectrometry applications are discussed.
Polar, heliophysical, and planetary science topics related to the International Heliophysical and Polar Years 2007-2009 were addressed during this circumpolar video conference hosted January 23-29, 2808 at the new Barrow Arctic Research Center of the Barrow Arctic Science Consortium in Barrow, Alaska. This conference was planned as an IHY-IPY event science outreach event bringing together scientists and educational specialists for the first week of sunrise at subzero Arctic temperatures in Barrow. Science presentations spanned the solar system from the polar Sun to Earth, Moon, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and the Kuiper Belt. On-site participants experienced look and feel of icy worlds like Europa and Titan by being in the Barrow tundra and sea ice environment and by going "on the ice" during snowmobile expeditions to the near-shore sea ice environment and to Point Barrow, closest geographic point in the U.S. to the North Pole. Many science presentations were made remotely via video conference or teleconference from Sweden, Norway, Russia, Canada, Antarctica, and the United States, spanning up to thirteen time zones (Alaska to Russia) at various times. Extensive educational outreach activities were conducted with the local Barrow and Alaska North Slope communities and through the NASA Digital Learning Network live from the "top of the world" at Barrow. The Sun- Earth Day team from Goddard, and a videographer from the Passport to Knowledge project, carried out extensive educational interviews with many participants and native Inupiaq Eskimo residents of Barrow. Video and podcast recordings of selected interviews are available at http://sunearthday.nasa.gov/2008/multimedidpodcasts.php. Excerpts from these and other interviews will be included in a new high definition video documentary called "From the Sun to the Stars: The New Science of Heliophysics" from Passport to Knowledge that will later broadcast on NASA TV and other educational networks. Full conference proceedings are accessible at http://polargateways2008.org/.
The new generation of Mars orbital topographic and imaging data justifies a new mapping effort of the Argyre impact basin and surroundings (-30.0deg to -65.0deg lat., -20.0deg to -70.0deg long; Fig.1). Our primary objective is to produce a geologic map of the Argyre region at 1:5,000,000 scale in both digital and print formats. The map will detail the stratigraphic and crosscutting relations among rock materials and landforms. These include Argyre basin infill, impact crater rim materials and adjoining highland materials of Noachis Terra, valleys and elongated basins that are radial and concentric about the primary Argyre basin, faults, enigmatic ridges, lobate debris aprons, and valley networks. Such information will be useful to the planetary science community for constraining the regional geology, paleohydrology, and paleoclimate. This includes the assessment of: (a) whether the Argyre basin contained lakes [1], (b) the extent of reported flooding and glaciation, which includes ancient flows of volatiles into the impact basin [2-4], (c) existing interpretations of the origin of the narrow ridges located in the southeast part of the basin floor [2,5], and (d) the extent of Argyre-related tectonism and its influence on the surrounding regions. Whereas the geologic mapping investigation of Timothy Parker focuses on the Argyre floor materials at 1:1,000,000 (MTMs -50036, -50043, -55036, -55043; see Fig. 1 for approximate corners of the area), our regional geologic mapping investigation includes the Argyre basin floor and rim materials, the transition zone that straddles the Thaumasia plateau, which includes Argyre impact-related modification [6], and the southeast margin of the Thaumasia plateau using important new data sets (Fig. 1). Our mapping effort will incorporate the map information of Parker if it is made available during the project.
Significantly large mass fractionations between chlorine isotopes (Cl-35, Cl-37) have been reported for terrestrial materials including both geological samples and laboratory materials. Also, the chlorine isotopic composition can be used as a tracer for early solar system processes. Moreover, chlorine is ubiquitous on the Martian surface. Typical chlorine abundances in Gusev soils are approx.0.5 %. The global surface average chlorine abundance also is approx.0.5 %. Striking variations among outcrop rocks at Meridiani were reported with some chlorine abundances as high as approx.2%. Characterizing conditions under which chlorine isotopic fractionation may occur is clearly of interest to planetary science. Thus, we have initiated development of a chlorine isotopic analysis technique using TIMS at NASA-JSC. We present here a progress report on the current status of development at JSC and discuss the possible application of chlorine isotopic analysis to Martian meteorites in a search for fluid- and possibly biological activity on Mars.