scholarly journals Sample return of primitive matter from the outer Solar System

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierre Vernazza ◽  
Pierre Beck

<p>The last thirty years of cosmochemistry and planetary science have shown that one major Solar System reservoir is vastly undersampled in the available suite of extra-terrestrial materials, namely small bodies that formed in the outer Solar System (>10AU). Because various dynamical evolutionary processes have modified their initial orbits (e.g., giant planet migration, resonances), these objects can be found today across the entire Solar System as P/D near-Earth and main-belt asteroids, Jupiter and Neptune Trojans, comets, Centaurs, and small (diameter <200km) trans-Neptunian objects. This reservoir is of tremendous interest, as it is recognized as the least processed since the dawn of the Solar System and thus the closest to the starting materials from which the Solar System formed. Some of the next major breakthroughs in planetary science will come from studying outer Solar System samples (volatiles and refractory constituents) in the laboratory. Yet, this can only be achieved by an L-class mission that<br />directly collects and returns to Earth materials from this reservoir. It is thus not surprising that two white papers advocating a sample return<br />mission of a primitive Solar System small body (ideally a comet) were submitted to ESA in response to its call for ideas for future L-class<br />missions in the 2035-2050 time frame. I will present an overview of the ideas listed in one of these two white papers and discuss how such a<br />mission would be complementary to current and future ground based observations of primitive Solar System small bodies.</p>

Author(s):  
P. Vernazza ◽  
P. Beck ◽  
O. Ruesch ◽  
A. Bischoff ◽  
L. Bonal ◽  
...  

AbstractThe last thirty years of cosmochemistry and planetary science have shown that one major Solar System reservoir is vastly undersampled in the available suite of extra-terrestrial materials, namely small bodies that formed in the outer Solar System (>10 AU). Because various dynamical evolutionary processes have modified their initial orbits (e.g., giant planet migration, resonances), these objects can be found today across the entire Solar System as P/D near-Earth and main-belt asteroids, Jupiter and Neptune Trojans, comets, Centaurs, and small (diameter < 200 km) trans-Neptunian objects. This reservoir is of tremendous interest, as it is recognized as the least processed since the dawn of the Solar System and thus the closest to the starting materials from which the Solar System formed. Some of the next major breakthroughs in planetary science will come from studying outer Solar System samples (volatiles and refractory constituents) in the laboratory. Yet, this can only be achieved by an L-class mission that directly collects and returns to Earth materials from this reservoir. It is thus not surprising that two White Papers advocating a sample return mission of a primitive Solar System small body (ideally a comet) were submitted to ESA in response to its Voyage 2050 call for ideas for future L-class missions in the 2035-2050 time frame. One of these two White Papers is presented in this article.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Day ◽  
Emily Law ◽  

&lt;p&gt;This presentation provides an overview of portals within NASA&amp;#8217;s Solar System Treks Project (SSTP) that specifically target small bodies within our Solar System. These, and all of the portals in the suite of Solar System Trek portals, are available at https://trek.nasa.gov.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;These portals each allow for visualization of different data products in 2D maps with various projections. They also allow users to conduct interactive 3D flyovers. The VR tool allows users to generate their own virtual reality flyovers for any user-defined paths along the bodies&amp;#8217; surfaces. Other tools let users measure distances, generate elevation plots, and create 3D print files for user-defined regions or the entire body.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;JAXA&amp;#8217;s Hayabusa 2 mission recently completed a campaign of reconnaissance, sample collection, and rover deployment at the near-Earth asteroid (162173) Ryugu. JAXA is providing mission data to SSTP, which is incorporating it into the new Ryugu Trek portal (https://trek.nasa.gov/ryugu). The internationalized user interface features controls in both English and Japanese. The portal&amp;#8217;s bookmarks feature takes users to particular areas of interest for more detailed looks at specific landforms and sites. On Ryugu, we focus on the surface sample site, impactor and sub-surface sample site, as well as landing sites and traverse paths for the HIBOU, OWL, and MASCOT rovers. We also highlight the first landforms on Ryugu to have been given official IAU names.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;While Hayabusa2 was exploring Ryugu, NASA&amp;#8217;s OSIRIS-REx mission began conducting a detailed examination of the asteroid (101955) Bennu, another near-Earth object. At the request of NASA&amp;#8217;s Planetary Science Division and the OSIRIS-REx mission, SSTP began implementation a new portal for the asteroid Bennu, featuring data that is being returned from OSIRIS-REx. The Bennu Trek portal (https://trek.nasa.gov/bennu) reveals Bennu&amp;#8217;s top-like shape, a fascinating commonality with Ryugu. It also reveals details of Bennu&amp;#8217;s intensely boulder covered terrain. Bookmarked features include Nightingale, Sandpiper, Osprey, and Kingfisher, the top four candidates for sample collection. We also highlight the first landforms on Bennu to have been given official IAU names. Each of these features were singled out as landmarks for OSIRIS-REx&amp;#8217;s Natural Feature Tracking (NFT) navigation method that will be used to guide the spacecraft down to its surface sample collection site.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;In its investigations of Vesta and Ceres, NASA&amp;#8217;s Dawn mission has returned spectacular data of the surfaces of these two prominent small bodies within the asteroid belt. This presentation will showcase the use of the Ceres Trek (https://trek.nasa.gov/ceres) and Vesta Trek (https://trek.nasa.gov/vesta) portals and demonstrate how they can be used to visualize and analyze particularly interesting landforms such as the pitted terrain on Vesta and relic cryovolcanoes on Ceres.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Under development at this time is a new portal for Mars&amp;#8217; larger Moon, Phobos. This portal will make extensive use of data from ESA&amp;#8217;s Mars Express. It is being designed in collaboration with JAXA to support Japan&amp;#8217;s upcoming Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) mission. This presentation will provide a preview of a prototype for Phobos Trek.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Other Near-Earth asteroids being considered as candidates for future portals include (433) Eros utilizing data gathered by the NEAR Shoemaker mission, and (25143) Itokawa using data from JAXA&amp;#8217;s Hayabusa mission. Together, a growing collection of small body Trek portals would enhance capabilities for comparative planetology among this fascinating class of objects.&amp;#160;&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;All of these products are efforts in the NASA Solar System Treks Project, available at https://trek.nasa.gov. NASA's Solar System Trek online portals provide web-based suites of interactive data visualization and analysis tools to enable mission planners, planetary scientists, students, and the general public to access mapped data products from past and current missions for a growing number of planetary bodies. These portals are being used for site selection and analysis by NASA and its international partners, supporting upcoming missions. In addition to demonstrating the capabilities of selected portals in this presentation, we will solicit input from the community for ideas for future enhancements.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The authors would like to thank the Planetary Science Division of NASA&amp;#8217;s Science Mission Directorate, NASA&amp;#8217;s SMD Science Engagement and Partnerships, the Advanced Explorations Systems Program of NASA&amp;#8217;s Human Exploration Operations Directorate, and the Moon to Mars Directorate for their support and guidance in the development of the Solar System Treks.&lt;/p&gt;


2004 ◽  
Vol 213 ◽  
pp. 263-270
Author(s):  
K. J. Meech ◽  
J. M. Bauer

We present a summary of ground-based work being done to gain an understanding of primitive comet, Centaur and Kuiper belt object compositions. We are seeing a diversity of compositions in outer solar system small bodies with respect to the presence of water and organics which may reflect both primordial differences and evolutionary processes.


2021 ◽  
Vol 53 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Seth Jacobson ◽  
Maitrayee Bose ◽  
Dennis Bodewits ◽  
Marc Fries ◽  
Devanshu Jha ◽  
...  

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan Schwamb ◽  
Michele Bannister ◽  
Michael Marsset ◽  
Wesley Fraser ◽  
Rosemary Pike ◽  
...  

&lt;p&gt;In August 2019, 2I/Borisov, the second interstellar object and first visibly active interstellar comet, was discovered on a trajectory nearly perpendicular to the ecliptic. Observations of planet forming disks and debris disks serve as probes of the ensemble properties of extrasolar planetesimals, but the passage of an active interstellar comet through our Solar System provides a rare opportunity to individually study these small bodies up close in the same ways in which we investigate objects originating from our own Outer Solar System. Ground-based observations of short period comet &lt;span&gt;67P/Churyumov&amp;#8211;Gerasimenko&lt;/span&gt; revealed a coma dust composition indistinguishable from what was measured on its nucleus by the orbiting &lt;em&gt;Rosetta&lt;/em&gt; spacecraft. Therefore when 2/I Borisov had a dust dominated tail, we attempted to study its composition with near-simultaneous griJ photometry with the Gemini North Telescope. We obtained two epochs of GMOS-N and NIRI observations in November 2019, separated by two weeks. We will report on the inferred optical-near-IR colors of 2I/I Borisov&amp;#8217;s dust coma/tail and nucleus. We will compare our measurements to other observations of 2I/Borisov and place the interstellar comet in context with the Col-OSSOS (Colours of the Outer Solar System Survey) sample of small KBOs and interstellar object &lt;span&gt;&amp;#699;Oumuamua&lt;/span&gt; observed in grJ with Gemini North, using the same setup.&lt;/p&gt;


2005 ◽  
Vol 1 (T26A) ◽  
pp. 179-180
Author(s):  
Kaare Aksnes Aksnes ◽  
J. Blue ◽  
J. Blunck ◽  
G.A. Burba ◽  
G. Consolmagno ◽  
...  

Since the IAU General Assembly in Sydney in July 2003, the WGPSN has conducted its business through numerous e-mail exchanges between the members. A nomenclature workshop was held at Hardingasete, western Norway on September 1–3, 2005. That meeting was attended by eight members from the WG and two from the Task Groups (TG) for the small bodies and for the outer solar system. Input to the meeting had also been received by e-mail from other members.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (0) ◽  
pp. 203-207
Author(s):  
S V. Shatokhina ◽  
O. M. Yizhakevych ◽  
Yu. I. Protsyuk ◽  
L. V. Kazantseva ◽  
L. K. Pakuliak ◽  
...  

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