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NASA Dragonfly Mission to Titan by Targeteer on 26 Jun, 2019 22:06
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Thoughts...
June 26, 2019
MEDIA ADVISORY M19-062
NASA to Announce New Solar System Mission, Hold Media Teleconference
NASA will announce a major new science mission to explore our solar system during a broadcast of NASA Science Live at 4 p.m. EDT Thursday, June 27. The announcement will air on NASA Television, the agency's website, Facebook Live, YouTube, Periscope and USTREAM.
Media may ask questions during the program by emailing their name, affiliation, and phone number to Courtney O’Connor at [email protected] by 3:45 p.m. Thursday. The public can send questions during the event using the hashtag #askNASA or by leaving a comment in the chat section of Facebook, Periscope or YouTube.
NASA also will host a media teleconference at 5 p.m. the same day with:
Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate
Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division
Curt Niebur, Lead Program Scientist for New Frontiers
Principal investigator of the selected mission
To participate in the call, media must email their name and affiliation to [email protected] by 4:45 p.m. Thursday.
The teleconference audio will stream live at:
https://www.nasa.gov/live
On Monday, July 1, NASA will host a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) about the mission announcement. Questions can be submitted to the Reddit AMA event when it begins at 3 p.m.
For more information on NASA programs and activities, visit:
https://www.nasa.gov
[zubenelgenubi: Previous New Frontiers 4 updates and discussion, including Dragonfly, in New Frontiers 4] -
#1 by yg1968 on 27 Jun, 2019 00:01
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#2 by Targeteer on 27 Jun, 2019 20:03
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Dragonfly it is
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#3 by Chris Bergin on 27 Jun, 2019 20:13
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#4 by Targeteer on 27 Jun, 2019 20:14
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Thanks for the title change Chris
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#5 by Chris Bergin on 27 Jun, 2019 20:16
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Launch vehicle will be selected three years from launch. Launching 2026, arriving 2034 - with gravity assists.
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#6 by Chris Bergin on 27 Jun, 2019 20:19
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#7 by Star One on 27 Jun, 2019 20:20
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This is the original NASA Tweet with links.
Awesome news in my book this decision.QuoteBIG NEWS: The next
@NASASolarSystem
mission is… #Dragonfly – a rotorcraft lander mission to Saturn’s largest moon Titan. This ocean world is the only moon in our solar system with a dense atmosphere & we’re so excited to see what Dragonfly discovers: (link: https://twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1BdGYARXvdYGX) twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1…
https://mobile.twitter.com/JimBridenstine/status/1144334797101260800 -
#8 by ccdengr on 27 Jun, 2019 20:27
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Is it DragonFly or Dragonfly? It's Dragonfly according to http://dragonfly.jhuapl.edu/index.php
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#9 by zubenelgenubi on 27 Jun, 2019 21:02
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Dragonfly! Wow! (I think the capital-D, lower case-f is the correct spelling.)
The sources I've seen have the mission name as one word.
Enjoying the country & western "hold" music before the 5 pm teleconference starts. -
#10 by Targeteer on 27 Jun, 2019 21:09
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June 27, 2019
RELEASE 19-052
NASA Selects Flying Mission to Study Titan for Origins, Signs of Life
NASA’s Dragonfly rotorcraft-lander
This illustration shows NASA’s Dragonfly rotorcraft-lander approaching a site on Saturn’s exotic moon, Titan. Taking advantage of Titan’s dense atmosphere and low gravity, Dragonfly will explore dozens of locations across the icy world, sampling and measuring the compositions of Titan's organic surface materials to characterize the habitability of Titan’s environment and investigate the progression of prebiotic chemistry.
Credits: NASA/JHU-APL
NASA has announced that our next destination in the solar system is the unique, richly organic world Titan. Advancing our search for the building blocks of life, the Dragonfly mission will fly multiple sorties to sample and examine sites around Saturn’s icy moon.
Dragonfly will launch in 2026 and arrive in 2034. The rotorcraft will fly to dozens of promising locations on Titan looking for prebiotic chemical processes common on both Titan and Earth. Dragonfly marks the first time NASA will fly a multi-rotor vehicle for science on another planet; it has eight rotors and flies like a large drone. It will take advantage of Titan’s dense atmosphere – four times denser than Earth’s – to become the first vehicle ever to fly its entire science payload to new places for repeatable and targeted access to surface materials.
Titan is an analog to the very early Earth, and can provide clues to how life may have arisen on our planet. During its 2.7-year baseline mission, Dragonfly will explore diverse environments from organic dunes to the floor of an impact crater where liquid water and complex organic materials key to life once existed together for possibly tens of thousands of years. Its instruments will study how far prebiotic chemistry may have progressed. They also will investigate the moon’s atmospheric and surface properties and its subsurface ocean and liquid reservoirs. Additionally, instruments will search for chemical evidence of past or extant life.
“With the Dragonfly mission, NASA will once again do what no one else can do,” said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. “Visiting this mysterious ocean world could revolutionize what we know about life in the universe. This cutting-edge mission would have been unthinkable even just a few years ago, but we’re now ready for Dragonfly’s amazing flight.”
Dragonfly took advantage of 13 years’ worth of Cassini data to choose a calm weather period to land, along with a safe initial landing site and scientifically interesting targets. It will first land at the equatorial “Shangri-La” dune fields, which are terrestrially similar to the linear dunes in Namibia in southern Africa and offer a diverse sampling location. Dragonfly will explore this region in short flights, building up to a series of longer “leapfrog” flights of up to 5 miles (8 kilometers), stopping along the way to take samples from compelling areas with diverse geography. It will finally reach the Selk impact crater, where there is evidence of past liquid water, organics – the complex molecules that contain carbon, combined with hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen – and energy, which together make up the recipe for life. The lander will eventually fly more than 108 miles (175 kilometers) – nearly double the distance traveled to date by all the Mars rovers combined.
“Titan is unlike any other place in the solar system, and Dragonfly is like no other mission,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA’s associate administrator for Science at the agency’s Headquarters in Washington. “It’s remarkable to think of this rotorcraft flying miles and miles across the organic sand dunes of Saturn’s largest moon, exploring the processes that shape this extraordinary environment. Dragonfly will visit a world filled with a wide variety of organic compounds, which are the building blocks of life and could teach us about the origin of life itself.”
Titan has a nitrogen-based atmosphere like Earth. Unlike Earth, Titan has clouds and rain of methane. Other organics are formed in the atmosphere and fall like light snow. The moon’s weather and surface processes have combined complex organics, energy, and water similar to those that may have sparked life on our planet.
Titan is larger than the planet Mercury and is the second largest moon in our solar system. As it orbits Saturn, it is about 886 million miles (1.4 billion kilometers) away from the Sun, about 10 times farther than Earth. Because it is so far from the Sun, its surface temperature is around -290 degrees Fahrenheit (-179 degrees Celsius). Its surface pressure is also 50 percent higher than Earth’s.
Dragonfly was selected as part of the agency’s New Frontiers program, which includes the New Horizons mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt, Juno to Jupiter, and OSIRIS-REx to the asteroid Bennu. Dragonfly is led by Principal Investigator Elizabeth Turtle, who is based at Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland. New Frontiers supports missions that have been identified as top solar system exploration priorities by the planetary community. The program is managed by the Planetary Missions Program Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, for the agency’s Planetary Science Division in Washington.
“The New Frontiers program has transformed our understanding of the solar system, uncovering the inner structure and composition of Jupiter’s turbulent atmosphere, discovering the icy secrets of Pluto’s landscape, revealing mysterious objects in the Kuiper belt, and exploring a near-Earth asteroid for the building blocks of life,” said Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division. “Now we can add Titan to the list of enigmatic worlds NASA will explore.”
For more information about Titan, visit:
https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/moons/saturn-moons/titan/overview
Read more about NASA’s New Frontiers Program and missions at:
https://planetarymissions.nasa.gov -
#11 by zubenelgenubi on 27 Jun, 2019 21:10
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Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate--three reasons for choice:
1) science
2) risk evaluation/elimination in Phase A
3) team
Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division, reviewing New Frontiers programs. (New Horizons, Juno, OSIRIS-REx). Giving context for decision for Dragonfly.
Brief statement from Elizabeth "Zibi" Turtle, Principal Investigator at JHUAPL. -
#12 by Tywin on 27 Jun, 2019 21:12
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Launch vehicle will be selected three years from launch. Launching 2026, arriving 2034 - with gravity assists.
2023 all the new generation launchers should be have enough record of fly in that time, for be eligible...Will see... -
#13 by zubenelgenubi on 27 Jun, 2019 21:19
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Chris Harwood opens, asking about enabling technologies/addressing mission risks.
Thomas Zurbuchen and Lori Glaze answer. Note the mature nature of autonomous flight, rotorcraft, instruments--new technology not needed, rather technical innovation.
Dragonfly arrives one Saturnian/Titanian year after Huygens landing, at a similar latitude.
Northern polar "lakes and seas" region is in northern winter darkness. No direct line of sight to Sun, therefore also no direct line-of-sight to Earth. Comm is direct transmission to Earth--mission to that region is precluded.
Mention made of Cassini's radar soundings of the sea/lake bottoms.
Terrain will change under flight plan from dunes to crater ejecta blanket to crater itself.
Risks: some are environmental. Extreme cold; operations in a hydrocarbon filled atmosphere--a first.
Sample taker re-design to address concerns about hydrocarbon sample clogging in the tube.
Mobility/flight also a focus of testing and development.
Systems engineering, and the initial enforced brevity of proposal necessitated further conversation to demonstrate the team had a grip on it.
"Our" David Clark! Asks about communication and control over Earth to Titan distance. Autonomy necessary due to "light delay."
One Titan day = 16 Earth days. Solving an problem triggering an autonomous abort (example: solution and transmission to Dragonfly takes one Earth day) delay exploration for a little more than one Titanian "hour."
Surface stability? Some testing is done in laboratory "Titan chambers." Observing and sampling any out-gassing is a desired opportunity.
"Second chance" for CAESAR? Other proposal opportunities in future years for CAESAR/Squires' team/comet sample return. Refers to experience on MESSENGER team. NF5 call for concepts circa 2022, with launch circa end of 2020's.
Selk is a large crater at equatorial latitude, accessible via direct entry (not via Saturnian orbit). Ejecta should contain refrozen water.
Trajectory/mission profile? Any dependence on LV choice? Venus-Earth-Earth-Gravity Assist trajectory is 8 years (2036-2034). EDL: dense atmosphere/low temperature--entry interface is very high above the surface, 1100 km. Longer EDL, less terror.
Flight with 1 failed rotor of any 8. Some, not all, configurations with 2 failed rotors are viable.
Any synergy with Mars Scout 'copter? 2 worlds opportunities for rotor flight.
Data sharing? Archive in PDS in a timely manner. Public image release ASAP. Other types of data, not as quick. [I assume there will be a proprietary period for the team to publish? before public release.]
Original launch year was to be 2025. One year offset to allow the teams to address challenges. 2025 Dragonfly launch followed by 2026 EGA. So, move launch to orginal 1st EGA timeframe. Arrival at the same time as 2025 launch.
The "extra" year will allow another year to optimize design, science, etc.
[EDIT 6/28
From the 4 pm webcast: MMRTG is in the inclined can on the rear of the flyer. It has the same appearance and general placing as the MMRTG on Curiosity.]
MMRTG charges battery. Battery drives rotors, instruments, etc. Battery use allows flight and also intense instrument use vs. power from MMRTG. [From the 4 pm webcast: the "long" limitation on an extended mission is MMRTG output to charge battery sufficiently for powered flight. I think they said 8 years.]
Entry interface at 1100 km. Atmosphere allows using a smaller drogue parachute. Drogue separation at 4 km, main parachute opens. Main parachute separation at 1km. Fly to landing. 2 hour EDL vs "7 minutes of terror."
Closing statement. Notes timeliness with Apollo 11 50th anniversary.
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[My question, thought of it after the teleconference: Could the autonomy/avionics be finessed to allow sample taking during a hover above an otherwise hazardous surface? Skid or skids touch surface to allow sample-taking, but no weight on the skids.] -
#14 by zubenelgenubi on 27 Jun, 2019 22:07
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(images with scale model)
I believe scale was 1 to 4. -
#15 by Robotbeat on 27 Jun, 2019 22:37
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Archived announcement video?
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#16 by dsmillman on 27 Jun, 2019 22:39
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Archived announcement video?
NASA TV will rebroadcast the announcement at 8pm and 10pm EDT. -
#17 by dglow on 27 Jun, 2019 22:53
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Do we know how the rotorcraft is powered – is that an RTG hanging off the back?
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#18 by ncb1397 on 27 Jun, 2019 22:59
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Archived announcement video?
The NASA TV stream on youtube goes back many hours.
edit: apparently it is up on the ScienceAtNASA youtube channel as well.
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#19 by speedevil on 27 Jun, 2019 22:59
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Do we know how the rotorcraft is powered – is that an RTG hanging off the back?
The proposal for this I read a year ago had a RTG.
There is little option for a long-term mission on a cloudy cold world.
