Hayabusa 2, Japan鈥檚 second mission to collect samples from an asteroid, is getting a MASCOT.
The German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Cologne and the Japan Aerospace and Exploration Agency (JAXA) in Tokyo announced this week that they have to send the German-built Mobile Asteroid Surface Scout, or MASCOT, on the mission, set to launch in 2014.
JAXA鈥檚 original Hayabusa probe was a success 鈥� but only just. Technical challenges ranging from failed engines to lost communications meant that the spacecraft returned home hobbled and late, bearing just a few precious pieces of the stony asteroid Itokawa.
Advertisement
Hayabusa was meant to do so much more. A small jumping rover called MINERVA was supposed to collect data on the asteroid鈥檚 temperature and surface variability, but it was released at the wrong time and drifted off into space.
In addition to overcoming past technical hurdles, Hayabusa 2 will study a different type of asteroid to answer fundamental questions about the origins of life on Earth, the best targets for space mining and how to deflect a threatening space rock.
Full scientific payload
About the size of a case of beer and weighing in at 10 kilograms, MASCOT will be able to tell us more than MINERVA ever could have. The robot will carry a full scientific payload to study the temperature, chemical composition, surface texture and magnetic properties of the target asteroid, a carbonaceous object called 1999 JU3.
The new lander will be a vital component of the mission. Since it can collect detailed information about its neighbourhood on the surface, it will put any collected samples in context, explains Ralf Jaumann, a DLR planetary researcher. The robot鈥檚 measurements will also help the main spacecraft decide which rocks to collect and bring back to Earth.
鈥淪ince the surface is heterogeneous, it鈥檇 be really neat to know on the fly what the compositions are, so you can make adjustments to your sampling strategy,鈥� says Trevor Ireland, a planetary scientist at Australia National University in Canberra, who was a member of the first Hayabusa science team.
Like MINERVA, MASCOT was made to jump rather than roll due to the asteroid鈥檚 variable terrain and weak gravitational field. But since it is much heavier than its predecessor, engineers had to : a set of rotating weights that quickly accelerate to fling the robot forward, then decelerate to make it land.
Bringers of life
If things go smoothly, MASCOT will help provide the most detailed glimpse yet of a carbonaceous asteroid, the most common type of space rock in our solar system. Some scientists have argued that these rocks were responsible for bringing water to Earth. Others have even suggested that they seeded life on our planet.
Carbonaceous asteroids seem to be 鈥渃hoc-a-block full of organics鈥�, says of the Australian Centre for Astrobiology in Sydney, and if they contain water and are exposed to sunlight, 鈥渢hey鈥檙e obviously of interest to the origin and evolution of life鈥�.
They could also be of practical importance to future space missions and asteroid miners, Steel says. 鈥淲hen we move off the Earth, asteroids will be the most accessible things in the solar system,鈥� he says. Carbonaceous asteroids might have everything needed to sustain life, as well as raw materials for manufacturing.
What鈥檚 more, since these asteroids are so common, knowing more about their structure might be critical to deflecting any incoming threats, says Ireland.
鈥淚f you were to send a rocket out there, Bruce Willis-style, you want to know if you could get into trouble,鈥� he says. 鈥淗ow do you attach yourself to it if you want to pull it, or how do you blow it up to cause some useful effect?鈥�
