COUNTDOWN TO MARS
Nasa Rover Set For Touchdown On Monday, Will Explore If Planet Can Support Life
Srinivas Laxman | TNN
Nasa’s 900-kg SUV-sized Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover — Curiosity — is slated to land on Mars on Monday to explore whether the Red Planet had an environment to support microbes and survey it as part of the preparations for its human exploration.
The event is being billed as a path-breaking one which, if successful, promises to be as significant as the landing of humans on the Moon in 1969.
Curiosity would operate for 98 weeks (nearly two years) and is about five times larger than earlier Mars exploration rovers — Spirit and Opportunity. Scientists hope that Curiosity, equipped with a suite of 11 advanced instruments, will better success of the earlier explorations. It would cover nearly 570 million km distance before touching down on the Red Planet’s Gale Crater and its heat shield will reach more than 2,000 degrees C as it takes off.
An on-board laboratory on Curiosity will study rocks, soil and the local geological settings to detect chemical building blocks of life and see what the Martian environment was like in the past. The nearly $2.5 billion mission carrying Curiosity was launched from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on November 26, 2011 on-board the powerful 58-m-tall Atlas V rocket as part of Nasa’s long term robotic Mars exploration programme.
Around 80 pyrotechnic devices will be activated on the spacecraft in quick succession to ensure that it lands safely during the final few minutes of Curiosity’s flight. An instrument on-board Curiosity — the Mars descent imager or Mardi — will record a full color video of the ground below and give space buffs an unprecedented sense of riding a spacecraft to a landing on Mars.
Indian engineer Ravi Prakash, helping Curiosity to manoeuvre complex entry, descent, and landing, said the mission is full of challenges and requires thousands of events to happen successfully in a matter of minutes.
He said the event is being called “seven minutes of terror’’ as it will take as much time for the spacecraft to halt on Mars after travelling from the top of the Martian atmosphere at a speed of 21,000 km per hour or five times as fast as a bullet. “During those seven minutes, the spacecraft will be on its own, automatically deciding when to perform each of the thousands of actions required for the landing,’’ he said.
Prakash said the nervewracking part of the event would be that while Curiosity would be on the surface of Mars, they will not know if it had survived the unforgiving atmosphere of Mars for 14 minutes. “It takes 14 minutes, travelling at the speed of light, for Nasa to send a signal from the Earth to the spacecraft and vice versa.’’
T he e n g i n e e r s a n d scientists working on the mission would monitor these developments at the mission control room at Nasa’s jet propulsion laboratory in Pasadena near Los Angeles.
Prakash said millions of simulations of the landing have been performed to make sure that entry, descent and landing are properly choreographed and to find out what could cause its failure. “The mission remains difficult and success cannot be guaranteed.’’
But MSL deputy project scientist Ashwin Vasavada is optimistic that everything would go smoothly. “I am pretty confident. We have done all we can to make it successful. But it is risky. I will be nervous on the landing day.’’ He said they have been living on Mars time for three months. A day on Mars is about 24 hours and 40 minutes.
Vasavada said they expect the first images from the rover about 90 minutes after the touchdown. “Colour images would follow a few hours later.’’
Prakash said several technological firsts such as guided entry and precision landing on another planet as well as the entire sky crane manoeuvre to land the largest rover yet on the surface of Mars have been employed for the first time.
The new technologies are being tried especially during the critical entry, descent and landing phase. This makes it the most challenging manoeuvre ever fraught with risks like never before.
COLD WAR RIVALS RUSSIA, US WARM UP TO SPACE JV
Cold war rivals Russia (then USSR) and the US have collaborated for the mission
The Federal Space Agency of Russia has contributed an instrument – dynamic albedo of neutrons (Dan) – to the rover that will detect water in the soil of the Red Planet
Dan consists of two blocks – one is a neutron generator and the other is an on-board micro computer
Dan’s neutron beams will be shot on the metre-deep Martian surface to detect water
Mars mission’s desi connection
A number of Nasa scientists and engineers of Indian origin are participating in the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission. But apart from this, India ranks third in the world and first among the developing nations in terms of the names being sent to Mars on MSL’s Curiosity rover to the Red Planet. The names have been etched on a microchip which Curiosity is carrying to Mars. The US has sent 5,29,386 names followed by the UK’s 77,329. Next to the UK is India with 59,041 names. Nasa had invited people from all over the world to participate in the mission by sending their names to be etched on the chip. The response has been overwhelming, according to Nasa.
Nasa Rover Set For Touchdown On Monday, Will Explore If Planet Can Support Life
Nasa’s 900-kg SUV-sized Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover — Curiosity — is slated to land on Mars on Monday to explore whether the Red Planet had an environment to support microbes and survey it as part of the preparations for its human exploration.
The event is being billed as a path-breaking one which, if successful, promises to be as significant as the landing of humans on the Moon in 1969.
Curiosity would operate for 98 weeks (nearly two years) and is about five times larger than earlier Mars exploration rovers — Spirit and Opportunity. Scientists hope that Curiosity, equipped with a suite of 11 advanced instruments, will better success of the earlier explorations. It would cover nearly 570 million km distance before touching down on the Red Planet’s Gale Crater and its heat shield will reach more than 2,000 degrees C as it takes off.
An on-board laboratory on Curiosity will study rocks, soil and the local geological settings to detect chemical building blocks of life and see what the Martian environment was like in the past. The nearly $2.5 billion mission carrying Curiosity was launched from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on November 26, 2011 on-board the powerful 58-m-tall Atlas V rocket as part of Nasa’s long term robotic Mars exploration programme.
Around 80 pyrotechnic devices will be activated on the spacecraft in quick succession to ensure that it lands safely during the final few minutes of Curiosity’s flight. An instrument on-board Curiosity — the Mars descent imager or Mardi — will record a full color video of the ground below and give space buffs an unprecedented sense of riding a spacecraft to a landing on Mars.
Indian engineer Ravi Prakash, helping Curiosity to manoeuvre complex entry, descent, and landing, said the mission is full of challenges and requires thousands of events to happen successfully in a matter of minutes.
He said the event is being called “seven minutes of terror’’ as it will take as much time for the spacecraft to halt on Mars after travelling from the top of the Martian atmosphere at a speed of 21,000 km per hour or five times as fast as a bullet. “During those seven minutes, the spacecraft will be on its own, automatically deciding when to perform each of the thousands of actions required for the landing,’’ he said.
Prakash said the nervewracking part of the event would be that while Curiosity would be on the surface of Mars, they will not know if it had survived the unforgiving atmosphere of Mars for 14 minutes. “It takes 14 minutes, travelling at the speed of light, for Nasa to send a signal from the Earth to the spacecraft and vice versa.’’
T he e n g i n e e r s a n d scientists working on the mission would monitor these developments at the mission control room at Nasa’s jet propulsion laboratory in Pasadena near Los Angeles.
Prakash said millions of simulations of the landing have been performed to make sure that entry, descent and landing are properly choreographed and to find out what could cause its failure. “The mission remains difficult and success cannot be guaranteed.’’
But MSL deputy project scientist Ashwin Vasavada is optimistic that everything would go smoothly. “I am pretty confident. We have done all we can to make it successful. But it is risky. I will be nervous on the landing day.’’ He said they have been living on Mars time for three months. A day on Mars is about 24 hours and 40 minutes.
Vasavada said they expect the first images from the rover about 90 minutes after the touchdown. “Colour images would follow a few hours later.’’
Prakash said several technological firsts such as guided entry and precision landing on another planet as well as the entire sky crane manoeuvre to land the largest rover yet on the surface of Mars have been employed for the first time.
The new technologies are being tried especially during the critical entry, descent and landing phase. This makes it the most challenging manoeuvre ever fraught with risks like never before.
COLD WAR RIVALS RUSSIA, US WARM UP TO SPACE JV
Cold war rivals Russia (then USSR) and the US have collaborated for the mission
The Federal Space Agency of Russia has contributed an instrument – dynamic albedo of neutrons (Dan) – to the rover that will detect water in the soil of the Red Planet
Dan consists of two blocks – one is a neutron generator and the other is an on-board micro computer
Dan’s neutron beams will be shot on the metre-deep Martian surface to detect water
Mars mission’s desi connection
A number of Nasa scientists and engineers of Indian origin are participating in the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission. But apart from this, India ranks third in the world and first among the developing nations in terms of the names being sent to Mars on MSL’s Curiosity rover to the Red Planet. The names have been etched on a microchip which Curiosity is carrying to Mars. The US has sent 5,29,386 names followed by the UK’s 77,329. Next to the UK is India with 59,041 names. Nasa had invited people from all over the world to participate in the mission by sending their names to be etched on the chip. The response has been overwhelming, according to Nasa.
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