An creative person ’s rendering of the SuperCam instrument aboard the next coevals Mars wanderer scheduled to visit the Red Planet in 2020 . look-alike reference : NASA
Last week , NASA ’s Mars 2020 mission reached a developmental milestone known as Key Decision Point C , having passed a meticulous expert review of its design . NASA has give permission ( and backing ) for engineers at Jet Propulsion Laboratory ( JPL ) in California to begin " cutting metal , " and the next four years will be spent on the fabrication and assembly of the spacecraft and its shipment of scientific instrumental role . Barring any unexpected technological problem , it will launch in summertime 2020 , as its name advise , and land in February 2021 . Its delegacy is to find grounds of past life on Mars .
CURIOSITY 2: THE NEXT LOGICAL STEP
An creative person concept image of where seven carefully pick out instruments will be site on NASA ’s Mars 2020 rover . The instruments will acquit unprecedented science and geographic expedition technology investigations on the Red Planet as never before . Image course credit : NASA
The Mars 2020 rover is based on the same design as the 2012 Curiosity rover , though it boasts a new suite of onboard instruments chosen to satisfy dissimilar scientific discipline objectives . Among other thing , Curiosity is a habitableness missionary station seeking to reply the interrogative sentence : " Could Mars have ever supported life ? " That dubiousness has been answered : yes . Mars 2020 , therefore , take the next logical measure , and seeks to regain that life . To do this , the nuclear - powered rover willexamine rocks , soil , and air , and in the outgrowth single-valued function and study elements , mineral , and organic compound . The wanderer will also host a eminent - resolution television camera with bird’s-eye and zoom feature — an rise to that found on Curiosity . A ground perforate radar will give scientist their first looking beneath the surface of Mars , creating what NASA describes as " sonogram - similar images " of subsurface structure . ( finger crossed for dinosaur os . ) NASA also hopes to charge a helicopter drone to scout in advance of the roamer , explore for interesting geology and safe route .
Another of Mars 2020 ’s aim will be the caching of Martian soil and John Rock sample . A collection arm will gather interesting materials , which will be examine and then inserted into small tubes . Once a requisite number of samples have been collect , the rover will posit the tubing in quality locations for some future rover to gather , package , and shoot into space . A dissimilar spacecraft will then bring the sample distribution box home for scientists to hit the books in telluric laboratories .
Mars 2020 is also part of NASA ’s " Journey to Mars " initiative , whose eventual finish is the landing place of humans on the red major planet . The rover will carry a gimmick called MOXIE , which is inadequate for " Mars OXygen In situ resource utilization Experiment . " ( They really had to elongate for that acronym . ) MOXIE will acquire atomic number 8 from carbon copy dioxide through a method acting called self-coloured oxide electrolysis . If the experiment is a success , make extremely pure oxygen , NASA intends to send a much bombastic variation of it to Mars , where it will get produce and storing a monolithic supply of strain for spaceman to pass off on some succeeding visit in the 2030s , as well as to provide the rockets with liquid oxygen for the journeying home .
The rover is as of yet unnamed . In the coming year , NASA will solicit assignment proposition from the publicas it did with Curiosity .
SEVEN MORE MINUTES OF TERROR
Because the rover plan for Mars 2020 is based on Curiosity , NASA will fundamentally repeat its famed 2012 debut , descent , and set ashore ( EDL ) . As seen in the " Seven Minutes of Terror " video , the space vehicle will enrol the Martian atmosphere at 13,000 mph before decelerating to 900 mph , adjusting of course using its thrusters . It will then deploy a ultrasonic chute and throw its heat shell . Once in position and flying at 200 miles per hour , it will come out by its back - shell and a sky crane will arouse up its arugula for a powered , soft descent . Once it strain 20 meters above the Martian surface , it will begin frown to the reason a tethered rover . After touchdown , the leash will detach and the sky crane will skyrocket away so as to avoid damage the bird of passage .
JPL has added a few new lineament to the Mars 2020 ’s EDL cortege . It can deploy its parachute with greater precision . Rather than relying on speed ( i.e. , " I ’m slow enough and will therefore deploy my chute " ) , it will useterrain - relation navigation(e.g . , " I run a risk overshoot my target and will therefore deploy my chute a bit earlier than expected , " or vice versa ) . This lessen the unevenness of the landing ellipse by 50 percent , mean the rover mission will start justly where scientists mean . The EDL also include terrain - relative navigation systems . After the parachute is deployed and the heat shield is jettisoned , an onboard photographic camera will canvass the terra firma and use an orbital map to figure out where it is over Mars . The sky Hart Crane can then avoid any risky terrain that might be nearby .
This artist ’s concept shows the sky crane maneuver during Curiosity ’s line of descent to the Martian open . Image credit entry : NASA / JPL - Caltech
For all previous Mars landings , the drop zone was necessarily bragging and bland , which is safe for engineer , but boring for scientist . With terrain sailing , Mars 2020 can now aim for scientifically interesting areas that have little patches of savorless terrain . While a landing place area has not yet been fix , land site that were previously spurn for Curiosity can now be consider .
Engineers have also sum a suite of cameras to the EDL system . Despite using parachutes to down Sojourner , Spirit , Opportunity , and Curiosity , nobody has ever really seen a parachute inflate supersonically on Mars . This time , however , tv camera will capture the action . In addition , descent cameras will record the ground rushing up to the spacecraft , and rover cameras will be point at the sky crane . The upshot is that for the first time , we will have real , torturing video of what it ’s like to down on Mars . The craft will also include a microphone , so we will know what it sounds like as well .
This is a lot to accomplish in four twelvemonth , though Curiosity solved many of the problems scientist and engineer are face on Mars 2020 . Moreover , because this mission inherit extra ironware from Curiosity , many portion needed are already build and tested . If the mission ’s name is to be exact , there is not much room for error . Should the mission fail to meet its launch windowpane , it will take another two years for the solar system to put Earth and Mars back into prize travelling conjunction .
