204— Identifying Candidate Landing and Sample Tube Depot Sites and Characterizing Rover Traverses for Mars Sample Return
Submission Type
Poster
Start Date
4-26-2021
Abstract
NASA and ESA are planning a Mars Sample Return (MSR) campaign that would retrieve Martian rocks and regolith to be collected by the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover for possible return to Earth. Candidate sample depots, landing sites, and traverse paths for MSR Sample Retrieval Lander (SRL) and Fetch Rover (SFR) must be identified in advance using High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) data.
Sites for landing and sample tube deposition are constrained by average slope, abundance of visible rocks, craters, aeolian bedforms, patch size, and proximity to notional traverse, and classified by terrain type. Areas within 50m of notional M2020/MSR traverse paths are classified by terrain type and approximate Cumulative Fractional Area (CFA) rock distribution. Traverse paths are less constrained than landing/depot sites and characterized by eight classes. Rock CFA is categorized into ~5%, 10%, and 15% bins.
Approximately 250 candidate landing/depot sites were identified and provide benign patches with typical spacing of several hundred meters. Most notional paths are extremely heterogeneous and have ~5% rock density. Final site selection is contingent upon future system engineering of MSR, performance of Mars 2020, and correlation between images from HiRISE and the rover, but these maps provide a baseline understanding of the area.
Recommended Citation
Deahn, Margaret, "204— Identifying Candidate Landing and Sample Tube Depot Sites and Characterizing Rover Traverses for Mars Sample Return" (2021). GREAT Day Posters. 103.
https://knightscholar.geneseo.edu/great-day-symposium/great-day-2021/posters-2021/103
204— Identifying Candidate Landing and Sample Tube Depot Sites and Characterizing Rover Traverses for Mars Sample Return
NASA and ESA are planning a Mars Sample Return (MSR) campaign that would retrieve Martian rocks and regolith to be collected by the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover for possible return to Earth. Candidate sample depots, landing sites, and traverse paths for MSR Sample Retrieval Lander (SRL) and Fetch Rover (SFR) must be identified in advance using High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) data.
Sites for landing and sample tube deposition are constrained by average slope, abundance of visible rocks, craters, aeolian bedforms, patch size, and proximity to notional traverse, and classified by terrain type. Areas within 50m of notional M2020/MSR traverse paths are classified by terrain type and approximate Cumulative Fractional Area (CFA) rock distribution. Traverse paths are less constrained than landing/depot sites and characterized by eight classes. Rock CFA is categorized into ~5%, 10%, and 15% bins.
Approximately 250 candidate landing/depot sites were identified and provide benign patches with typical spacing of several hundred meters. Most notional paths are extremely heterogeneous and have ~5% rock density. Final site selection is contingent upon future system engineering of MSR, performance of Mars 2020, and correlation between images from HiRISE and the rover, but these maps provide a baseline understanding of the area.
Comments
Sponsored by Nicholas Warner.
This research has also been presented at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory Intern Final Presentations (Summer 2020), the Geological Society of America Conference (Fall 2020) and the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (Spring 2021).
This research is supported through funding from the NASA Summer Undergraduate Program for Planetary Research (SUPPR), Caltech Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF), JPL Summer Internship Program, and the Hawaii NASA Space Grant Consortium. Special thanks to the members of the Mars Sample Return Campaign team at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the European Space Agency.