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OUTSIDE THIS WORLD | What's Up In Space – The greatest news coming from space from Earth
Scott Sutherland
Meteorologist / Scientific Editor
Friday, October 26, 2018 at 6:40 pm – Only One Month From now, NASA's InSight LG will plunge into the Martian atmosphere for a seven-minute thrill ride on the surface of the Red Planet. In addition, a new idea of orbiting a spacecraft around Pluto and the last days of NASA's exoplanets fighter. That's what's new in the space!
SEVEN MINUTES OF EARTH OF INSIGHT
A little more than 6 years ago, NASA's Curiosity robot had its human limbs on the edge of their seats, as it was performing a fully automated and controlled descent. computer from the top of Mars & # 39;
According to Tom Rivellini, engineer at Entry, Descent & Landing (EDL), Curiosity's landing was called "Seven Minutes of Terror", "because we literally have seven minutes to get to the top of the atmosphere. " on the surface of Mars, ranging from 13,000 km / h to zero, in a perfect sequence, a perfect choreography, a perfect synchronization, and the computer must do it all alone, without help from the ground.
Adam Steltzner, Chief Engineer at the EDL Division, added that at the time, the communication gap was 14 minutes due to the distance between Earth and Mars. So, with the seven-minute descent to the surface, by the time NASA received the signal sent by Curiosity just as it was reaching the top of the Mars atmosphere, it had just begun its descent, the rover was already on the ground for seven minutes, either in one block, ready to receive orders, or in a thousand pieces scattered in the Martian landscape.
On October 26, 2018, a group of EDL engineers did not
In a month it will take another seven minutes of worry
The InSight lander, NASA's mission of probing the interior of Mars in search of "marsquakes ", must reach the red planet on November 26th. When that happens, the same descent "seven-minute terror" will follow the surface of Mars, slowing from 21,200 km / h (13,200 miles to the hour) at the top of the zero-to-the-air atmosphere area.
The only major differences between the Curiosity and InSight landings are 1) Insight will make a direct landing on Mars, using its own propellers, rather than the "celestial crane" method used by Curiosity, and 2) Mars will only be Only eight minutes of light from Earth, when NASA receives the signal that InSight has begun its descent, it will be on the surface, "alive" or "dead", for about a minute.
This illustrated sequence shows the stages of the descent of Mars Insight. Credit: NASA JPL
Without the additional complication of the open-air crane, the landing of InSight will look very much like that carried out by NASA's Phoenix mission, which landed in May 2008. Nevertheless, according to NASA, Phoenix landed at an altitude lower than that of InSight, and so, he had a mile and a half of extra atmosphere to go through to help braking, which InSight would have. Even with the extremely thin atmosphere of Mars (compared to Earth), an extra mile 1.5
really helps .
Fortunately, the InSight parachute is much stronger than the Phoenix, with reinforced support cables, so that it will unfold earlier during the landing, which will leave it more time to slow down the descent of InSight.
Learn more about
InSight on the NASA website, and stay on the lookout for new InSight content in the coming weeks.
A revolutionary idea for the return to Pluto
When NASA's New Horizon spacecraft flew over Pluto and its moons more than three years ago, we cast a frustrating and brief look at these remarkable worlds.
These near-true colors on Pluto and Charon were captured while New Horizons was adopted by these worlds in July 2015. Photo: NASA / JHUAPL / SwRI
As incredible as it may be to see Pluto, Charon and the little moons so close together, we still needed them. Much more!
Now, a team from the Southwest Research Institute, led by Dr. Alan Stern – the same global scientist at the helm of the New Horizons mission – has come up with a new Pluto mission idea. However, it would be better to place a spacecraft in orbit around the Pluto system and use the gravity of Pluto's largest moon, Charon, to propel it into this region of space, in order to conduct a thorough investigation of the system. .
According to SwRI:
The team first discovered how many key scientific objectives could be achieved using the gravitational aids provided by Charon, Pluto's giant satellite, thus allowing orbiter to modify its orbit several times, in order to examine various Pluto, its atmosphere, its five moons and its interactions with the solar wind for several years. The second realization shows that after reaching its scientific objectives at Pluto, the orbiter can then use Charon's gravity to escape the system without using fuel, launching the spacecraft into the Kuiper belt in order to use the same electric propulsion system that he had usually come into orbit at Pluto. then explore other dwarf planets and other smaller bodies of the Kuiper Belt.
CLICK TO ENLARGE. This "spaghetti" of complicated lines represents the use by this spacecraft of Charon gravity (rather than its own fuel) to launch it around the Pluto system. and far enough to investigate other nearby targets. Credit: Southwest Research Institute
"This is revolutionary," Stern said in SwRI's press release. "Previously, NASA and the global scientific community thought that the next step in exploring the Kuiper Belt would be to choose between" deepening "the study of Pluto and its moons or" expanding "by examining smaller objects from the Kuiper belt and another dwarf planet – a comparison with Pluto The global scientific community has been debating the next step, and our studies show that you can accomplish both tasks with one mission: to change the game. "
THE LAST GASP OF TELESCOPE KEPLER?
The NASA Kepler telescope has found thousands of planets orbiting other stars, with thousands of others waiting for confirmation, and there is even more data than scientists and Citizen Scientists have to travel, locate even more.
NASA's Kepler Space Telescope follows behind the Earth, in its orbit around the Sun, while searching for tail "transits" indicating the presence of planets around other stars. Credit: NASA
This week, however, after months of exploiting the full scientific potential of this telescope, we seem to have heard our last testimony from Kepler.
According to the latest Kepler update by NASA, dated October 23:
As a result of the successful return of data from the last observation campaign, the Kepler team has ordered the spacecraft to position itself to begin collecting data for its next campaign. On Friday, October 19, during a regular contact with a satellite using the NASA Deep Space Network, the team learned that the satellite had gone into standby mode without using fuel. The Kepler Team is Evaluating the Cause and Possible Next Steps
Since the telescope was primarily focused on smoke fumes, there is a good chance that it will simply be the end of its mission . 19659007] With the launch of TESS, the satellite transits investigation of the exoplanets of NASA, which may have already found its first exoplanet, the moment is certainly well chosen to pbad the torch after two very successful missions.
Sources:
NASA |
SwRI |
NASA
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