- 4338 - SPACE MISSIONS in 2024? Mostly scientists want space missions to bring back samples. They burn the material to ashes measuring the organic compounds and other species that are liberated in the process.
------------------------- 4338 - SPACE MISSIONS in 2024?
- An example is the safe return of NASA’s
“Osiris-Rex mission” from asteroid “(101955) Bennu” in September, 2023. It was
an even greater pleasure to receive a few precious crumbs of Bennu to study.
-
- NASA’s series of “Commercial Lunar Payload
Service” (CLPS) missions, many of which will launch in 2024, are set to bring a
variety of instruments to the Moon.
-
- The CLPS program is part of NASA’s Artemis
initiative to continue human exploration of the Moon. One of the main aims of
the program is to investigate the possibilities of using lunar resources as
fuel. Some of the instruments on
CLPS-1, “Peregrine”, are designed to
assess the amount of hydrogen on the lunar surface.
-
- CLPS-2 is timetabled to launch in early
January, 2024, and there are four other CLPS missions planned for launch
throughout the year. It is hoped that
human exploration of the Moon will take a small step forward, possibly as early
as November, 2024, when Artemis II orbits the Moon for several days.
-
- NASA’s Trailblazer mission travels to the
Moon to understand where any water is situated. Is it locked inside rock as
part of the mineral structure, or is it deposited as ice on the rocky surface? Trailblazer is currently scheduled for
launch in the first quarter of 2024.
-
- The launch of Chang’e 6, the latest Chinese
mission to the Moon, is planned for May, 2024 and is intended to bring material
back to Earth. This is particularly significant because the spacecraft will
collect material from the lunar farside, the South Pole Aitkin Basin.
-
- This is a region where it is believed there
is abundant frozen water. We do not have any samples of material from this part
of the Moon, and although any ice will be long gone by the time the samples are
back on Earth, it is anticipated we will learn a lot about this unexplored
region and its potential as a source of water for human visitors.
-
- In September, 2022, NASA’s Dart mission
encountered a system consisting of two asteroids called Didymos and Dimorphos,
and crashed into Dimorphos. The impact had a purpose: to see if such a
collision could divert the asteroid in its path, a necessary goal if ever Earth
were to be the target of a direct hit by an incoming asteroid.
-
- Two years later, the European Space
Agency’s “Hera mission'” will launch to visit the same pair of asteroids. It is
not designed to hit either body, but to measure the effect of Dart’s earlier
impact. At the time of the collision, the orbit of Dimorphos around Didymos got
faster by 33 minutes, a significant movement that showed the path of an
asteroid could be deflected.
-
- But what we don’t know is how effective the
impact was. Has Dimorphos remained in its new orbit, bounced back into its old
orbit, or continued to speed up? Hera will investigate in detail and its
results will help to define Earth’s planetary protocol.
-
- This “Europa Clipper mission” has been
long-awaited, ever since the Galileo mission first showed us views of Europa’s
icy surface in the late 1990s. Since then, we have learned about the ocean that
lurks beneath the icy shell. Europa may host life in the form of a substantial
fauna analogous to the animals that live on the deep ocean floor around
hydrothermal vents.
-
- Europa Clipper will fly past Europa between
40 and 50 times, taking detailed images of the surface, monitoring the
satellite for icy plumes, and, most importantly, looking to see whether this
moon has the conditions suitable to support life. The mission will also
investigate whether Europa’s ocean is salty, and whether the essential building
blocks of life (carbon, nitrogen and sulfur) are present.
-
- It is not until 2030 that any of these
observations will be transmitted back to us, so we will have to wait patiently
until then. The investigation will be complemented by observations from ESA’s
Juice mission, which is currently on its way to Jupiter.
-
- The moon. Phobos, is one of the satellites
of Mars. The launch of the Japanese
Space Agency’s Martian Moon Exploration (MMX) mission to Phobos is currently
scheduled for September,2024, and designed to return material to Earth in
2029. Can't wait to analyze a unique
sample from this enigmatic body. There
is always more to learn.
-
-
February 1, 2023 SPACE
MISSIONS in 2024? 4338
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------- Comments appreciated and Pass it on to
whomever is interested. ---
--- Some reviews are at: -------------- http://jdetrick.blogspot.com -----
-- email feedback, corrections, request for
copies or Index of all reviews
--- to: ------ jamesdetrick@comcast.net ------
“Jim Detrick” -----------
--------------------- --- Friday, February 2,
2024
---------------------------------
No comments:
Post a Comment