Lander to aim for comet’s ‘head’

From the Rosetta Lander Philae to an Asteroid Hopper: Lander Concepts for Small Bodies Missions

The investigation of small bodies, comets and asteroids, can contribute substantially to our understanding of the formation and history of the Solar System. In situ observations by Landers play an important role in this field. The Rosetta Lander – Philae – is currently on its way to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Philae is an example of a ~100 kg landing platform, including a complex and high...

Computational Aeroheating Predictions for Mars Lander Configurations

The proposed Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission is intended to deliver a large rover to the Martian surface within 10 km of the target site. This paper presents computational fluid dynamics (CFD) predictions of forebody heating rates for two MSL entry configurations with fixed aerodynamic trim tabs. Results are compared to heating on a 70-deg sphere-cone reference geometry. All three heatshi...

Analysing Rock Samples for the Mars Lander

In the near future NASA intends to explore various regions of our solar system using robotic devices such as rovers, spacecraft, airplanes, and/or balloons. Such platforms will carry imaging devices, and a variety of analytical instruments intended to evaluate the chemical and mineralogical nature of the environment(s) that they encounter. The imaging and/or spectroscopic devices will acquire t...

The CG Mars Lander

Following comets

an inferior hand of genes. Fetuses are today commonly screened for genetic disorders and this service will no doubt expand. An American company has devised a one-inch chip carrying 400,000 DNA fragments, which will allow the entire human genome to be screened for an average of four alleles per gene. The difference between eliminating the undesirable and promoting the advantageous is becoming to...