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NASA interior on Mars
Exploration with the help of seismic surveys, geodesy and heat transport (InSight) is on the right track
for a soft touch on the surface of the red planet on Monday, November 26
after Thanksgiving. But it's not going to be a relaxing weekend in Turkey
leftovers, football and shopping for the InSight mission team. The engineers are going
keep a close eye on the flow of data indicating health and InSight
monitoring the Martian weather to determine if the team needs to
make the final adjustments for landing in just five days.
"Landing on Mars is difficult, it takes talent,
concentration and years of preparation, "said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate director
for the leadership of the science mission at NASA headquarters in Washington.
"Keeping in mind our ambitious goal of finally sending humans to
surface of the Moon then of Mars I know that our incredible science and
engineering team – the only one in the world to have successfully landed a spaceship
on the Martian surface – will do everything possible to land successfully
InSight on the red planet. "
InSight, the
first mission to study the deep interior of Mars, taken off from Vandenberg
Air Force Base Central California May 5, 2018. This flight was uneventful.
on Mars, and the engineers like that. They are going to have a lot of excitement
when InSight reaches the peak of the Martian atmosphere at 12,300 mph (19,800 km / h)
and slows down to 5 mph (8 km / h) – about the speed of human jogging – before his three
the legs touch the Martian soil. This extreme deceleration must occur in
just under seven minutes.
"There is a
Reasons Why Engineers Call Landing on Mars' Seven Minute of Terror, "Rob said
Grover, head of NASA's jet-based entry, descent and landing (EDL) at InSight
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "We can not use the joystick
landing, so we have to rely on the controls we pre-program into the spacecraft.
We spent years testing our plans, learning from other landings on Mars and studying
all the conditions that Mars can impose on us. And we will remain vigilant until
InSight installs in the Elysium Planitia region. "
One way
engineers may be able to quickly confirm the activities performed by InSight during
these seven minutes of terror is so experimental mission CubeSat known as March
Cube One (MarCO) relays InSight data on Earth in near real time
during their flight on November 26th. The two MarCO ships (A and B) make
good progress towards their meeting point, and their radios have already
spent their first tests in deep space.
"Just by
surviving the journey so far, both MarCO satellites have made a giant leap for
CubeSats, "said Anne Marinan, system engineer at MarCO, based at JPL.
"And now, we are preparing for the next test of MarCO – serving as
possible model for a new type of interplanetary communications relay. "
If everything happens
MarCOs may take a few seconds to receive and format the data before
send it back to Earth at the speed of light. That would mean engineers to
JPL and another team at Lockheed Martin Space in Denver would be able to tell
What the LG did during the EDL about eight minutes after InSight
is completing its activities. Without MarCO, the InSight team should wait
several hours for the engineering data to be returned via the main communications
Access Routes – Relay Through Mars Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Odyssey of NASA
orbiter.
Once engineers
know that the spacecraft has landed safely in one of several
ways they need to confirm this step and that the solar of InSight
the matrices are well deployed, the team can settle in the care,
process of deploying scientific instruments lasting three months.
"Landing on Mars is exciting, but
Scientists eagerly await the day after landings of InSight, "said Lori
Glaze, acting director of the Planetary Science Division at NASA headquarters.
"Once InSight installed on the red planet and its instruments are
deployed, he will begin to collect valuable information on the structure of the
The deep inside of Mars – information that will help us understand the training
and the evolution of all rocky planets, including the one we call home. "
"Previous
the missions did not go further than the skin on Mars, "Sue Smrekar added.
Deputy Chief Investigator of the InSight Mission at JPL. "Insight
Scientists are eager to explore the heart of Mars. "
JPL manages InSight for NASA
Direction of the scientific mission. InSight is part of NASA's discovery program,
managed by the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
Lockheed Martin Space in Denver built the InSight probe, including its
cruise stage and lander, and supports the spaceship operations for the mission.
A number of European partners,
including the French National Center for Space Studies (CNES) and the
Aerospace Center (DLR), support the mission InSight. CNES provided the
Seismic Experience for Interior Structure (SEIS)
instrument, with important contributions from the Max Planck Institute for
Solar System Research (MPS) in Germany, Swiss Institute of Technology (ETH)
in Switzerland, Imperial College and Oxford University in the United Kingdom,
and JPL. DLR provided the heat flux package and physical properties (HP3)
instrument, with important contributions from the Space Research Center (CBK)
of the Polish Academy of Sciences and Astronika in Poland. Center of Spain
Astrobiology (CAB) provided the wind sensors.
For more information on the InSight mission, visit:
https://mars.nasa.gov/insight
For
more information about MarCO, visit:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/cubesat/missions/marco.php
Media contact
Jia-Rui Cook / D.C. Agle
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California
818-354-5011
[email protected] / [email protected]
Dwayne Brown / JoAnna Wendel
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1726 / 202-358-1003
[email protected] / [email protected]
2018-272
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