Optical Imager (NAC)Wide Angle Camera (WAC)Infrared Imager/Spectrometer (IR)UV Spectrograph (UVS)(Sub-)Surface RadarMagnetometer (MAG)Plasma Spectrometer PackageElectric field and Cold PlasmaRadio Science Experiment
That's 8 compared to Psyche's 3! Crazy! If that wasn't enough their page goes on to mention including a cubesat with their mission. Ambitious to say the least, although I'd assume ESA would view such ambition as skeptically as their American counterparts would in mission evaluation.
As I understand it the PLATO situation was a special case. When PLATO failed to be selected for M1/M2 it was specifically decided it would be retained to compete in a future selection;http://sci.esa.int/cosmic-vision/49385-dark-and-bright-esa-chooses-next-two-science-missions/I suspect this was done to ensure the exoplanet community didn't give up proposing so ESA wouldn't be left without the choice. As far as I know there was no similar statement after the M4 selection.
Will not the cost of the forthcoming orbital gravitational wave observatory impact all these kind selections?
Quote from: Star One on 01/21/2017 08:47 pmWill not the cost of the forthcoming orbital gravitational wave observatory impact all these kind selections?Why would L3 mission that is almost two decades from launch have any effect here? I'm also not sure why you think a gravitational wave mission would be especially costly (more so than any other large-class mission). ExoMars stuff, on the other hand, could have an effect if they go ahead with plans to divert money from science budget.
I don't know where you're getting that time scale from being as they've been indicating that they want to bring forward as soon as possible the mission I thought to the late 2020s.
I think this thread should be renamed for clarity. It should be something like "ESA's M5 Space Science Mission Competition" or something. "M5" alone is pretty obscure.
This isn't about BMWs?
Quote from: as58 on 02/04/2017 02:29 pmThis isn't about BMWs?I'm such a Trekkie that the only thing that comes to mind is the M5 computer.
(For pursuit on another thread here, if any--Is the difference between Trekkie and Trekker still important (to the fan community)? Or is the distinction passé?)
Rumoured to have survived @esa M5 cut: AKON ALFVEN CASTALIA E-ASTROGAM ESCAPE GALILEO-GALILEI HEAVY-METAL HERA SELMA SPICA THEIA THESEUS
Also rumoured to have survived @esa M5 cut are a phobos/deimos mission and a Jupiter mission but not sure I have the names right.
Also a bit surprised by EnVision. As for sample return/MarcoPolo it looks like ESA is essentially saying it needs to be an L-class, or at least an optional program like the ESA/Roscosmos Phobos sample return concept.
Yeah wasn't asking for technical details, just any kind of official statement on what has passed selection. They posted which letters of intent had been received for S1; http://sci.esa.int/cosmic-vision/50265-received-letters-of-intent/.
edit: Related to M5: the proposal for EnVision, which apparently didn't make it through the pre-selection, appeared on arxiv in the latest posting. https://arxiv.org/abs/1703.09010
But some painful ESA suggestions of sacrifices to meet budgetary reality in the M class prog. M4&M5 selections pushed into future #EGU17
A little late in updating this as it slipped my mind but I have the full list of 13 semi-finalists in the M5 competition. Turns out the previous rumours were slightly wrong, ENVISION did in fact make it and no Jupiter mission got through;HEAVY METAL: Exploring a magnetized metallic asteroidHERA: Saturn Entry Probe MissionJANUS. Exploring the asymmetric magnetosphereDEPHINE: Deimos and Phobos Interior ExplorerSELMA: Surface, Environment and Lunar Magnetic AnomaliesENVISION: Understanding why our most Earth neighbor is so differente-ASTROGAM: At the hearth of the extreme UniverseESCAPE: European SpaceCraft for the study of Atmospheric Particle EscapeGALILEO Galilei (GG): a mission to test the founding pillar of General Relativity to 10-17CASTALIA: A mission to a Main Belt CometTHESEUS: Transient High Energy Sky and Early Universe SurveyorSPICA: Unveiling the obscured UniverseALFVEN: A mission to study particle acceleration in strongly magnetized plasmasDownselect to 3 finalists is I understand in February 2018 after a 6-month delay due to the funding issues at the last ministerial conference. There were complications with the M4 final selection which was due in November that has also caused delay, so I would expect that result any time now.
A little late in updating this as it slipped my mind but I have the full list of 13 semi-finalists in the M5 competition. Turns out the previous rumours were slightly wrong, ENVISION did in fact make it and no Jupiter mission got through
Quote from: Alpha_Centauri on 12/24/2017 02:43 pmA little late in updating this as it slipped my mind but I have the full list of 13 semi-finalists in the M5 competition. Turns out the previous rumours were slightly wrong, ENVISION did in fact make it and no Jupiter mission got throughAlpha_Centauri, can you tell me where this is posted?
Posted? Well confusingly there are a few different lists doing the rounds on the internet, but as I understand it this is an example of the correct one from a CNES presentation to the French Astrophysics and Astronomy Society in July (page 35);http://sf2a.eu/semaine-sf2a/2017/presentations/S00/CNES_2017.pdf
Quote from: Alpha_Centauri on 12/24/2017 02:43 pmA little late in updating this as it slipped my mind but I have the full list of 13 semi-finalists in the M5 competition. Turns out the previous rumours were slightly wrong, ENVISION did in fact make it and no Jupiter mission got through;HEAVY METAL: Exploring a magnetized metallic asteroidHERA: Saturn Entry Probe MissionJANUS. Exploring the asymmetric magnetosphereDEPHINE: Deimos and Phobos Interior ExplorerSELMA: Surface, Environment and Lunar Magnetic AnomaliesENVISION: Understanding why our most Earth neighbor is so differente-ASTROGAM: At the hearth of the extreme UniverseESCAPE: European SpaceCraft for the study of Atmospheric Particle EscapeGALILEO Galilei (GG): a mission to test the founding pillar of General Relativity to 10-17CASTALIA: A mission to a Main Belt CometTHESEUS: Transient High Energy Sky and Early Universe SurveyorSPICA: Unveiling the obscured UniverseALFVEN: A mission to study particle acceleration in strongly magnetized plasmasDownselect to 3 finalists is I understand in February 2018 after a 6-month delay due to the funding issues at the last ministerial conference. There were complications with the M4 final selection which was due in November that has also caused delay, so I would expect that result any time now.Thank you. Been wondering when something would happen with this call. Surprising number of solar system missions (which tend to be more complex than astronomy or astrophysics missions). I think it would be hard for Heavy Metal or Dephine to be selected given the Psyche and MMX missions. The proposed M5 missions would do additional science compared to the approved missions, but I doubt it would be enough more to make either selectable.
Totally agree with your point about Heavy Metal & Delphine as they should be easy eliminations being as they are already been done by other missions.
Quote from: Star One on 12/24/2017 10:20 pmTotally agree with your point about Heavy Metal & Delphine as they should be easy eliminations being as they are already been done by other missions.I'm actually curious about the timing of ESA's selection of these missions. From their website, it appears it would have occurred after NASA's selection of the Psyche mission and JAXA's approval of the MMX mission.
SPICA no longer candidate for ESA's M5 mission selectionThe European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency's Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS/JAXA) have announced their decision to no longer consider the infrared space observatory, SPICA, as a candidate for the upcoming selection as ESA's 5th medium-class mission in its Cosmic Vision Programme (M5).
You wait ages for a mission to Venus and then three come along at once.The European Space Agency has just selected a probe called Envision to go study the second planet from the Sun.