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LOS ANGELES (REUTERS) – NASA's first robotic lander, designed to study the deep interior of a distant world, has moved closer to Mars on its way to a touchdown scheduled for Monday, November 26th. a six-month trip in space.
Traveling 548 million kilometers from Earth, the Mars InSight spacecraft was to reach its destination on the dusty, rock-strewn surface of the Red Planet at around 3 pm Eastern Time (Tuesday Singapore).
If all goes as planned, InSight will insinuate in the Martian pink sky at 19,310 km / h. Its 123 km descent on the surface will be slowed down by atmospheric friction, a giant parachute and retro rockets. When he lands 6½ minutes later, he will travel just 8 km / h.
The stationary probe, which was launched in California in May, will then pause for 16 minutes to allow dust to settle, literally, around the landing site before its disc-shaped solar panels unfold. to provide energy.
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) Mission Control Team Expects Real-Time Electronic Confirmation of Safe Space Vehicle Arrival by Miniature Satellites Launched with InSight and having to fly over Mars.
JPL controllers also expect to receive a photo of the probe's environment in the smooth, martian plain near the planet's equator, called Elysium Planitia.
The site is located about 600 km from the 2012 Curiosity landing point, the last spacecraft the size of a car, the last spacecraft sent to the Red Planet by NASA.
The smallest, 360kg InSight – its name is the abbreviation of Indoor Intelligence using seismic surveys, geodesy and heat transport – marks the 21st Martian exploration launched by the United States, including missions Sixty – odd other Mars missions were sent by other countries.
How rocky planets formed
InSight is the first site dedicated to discovering deep secrets under the Martian surface. The lander will spend 24 months – about a Martian year – using seismic monitoring and underground drilling to collect clues about the formation of Mars and, by extension, about the origins of the Earth and other planets Rockies of the internal solar system there are more than four billion years.
"What this helps us understand, is how we got there," said Bruce Banerdt, JPL's principal investigator of InSight, at a pre-briefing. landing with reporters last week.
While tectonic Earth and other forces have erased most of the early evidence, much of Mars – about a third of its size – would have remained largely static over the centuries, creating a machine geological time for scientists.
The main instrument of InSight is an extremely sensitive French-made seismometer, designed to detect the smallest vibrations caused by "Mars tremors" and meteor impacts.
Scientists expect to see a dozen to 100 earthquakes on Mars during the mission, producing data to infer the size, density and composition of the planet.
The Viking probes of the mid-1970s were equipped with seismometers, but they were bolted to the top of the landing gear, a design that proved largely ineffective.
InSight is also equipped with a German-made drill for digging up to 5 m underground, pulling a rope-shaped heat probe behind it to measure heat.
Meanwhile, a radio transmitter will send signals to the Earth and follow the subtle rotational movement of Mars to reveal the size of the planet's nucleus and eventually determine whether it remains melted.
The InSight mission and the upcoming mobile mission, along with others at the planning stage, are seen as precursors to the possible human exploration of Mars, NASA officials said.
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