“LICIACube – the Light Italian Cubesat for Imaging of Asteroids” is managed by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and will be part of the NASA DART mission, with the aim of i) documenting the DART ...impact’s effects on the secondary member of the (65803) Didymos binary asteroid system, ii) characterizing the shape of the target, and iii) performing dedicated scientific investigations on it. DART probe will be launched at the end of 2021 and LICIACube will be hosted as piggyback during the interplanetary cruise, then released 10 days before the impact, and autonomously guided along its fly-by trajectory. The LICIACube payload is composed by LEIA, a narrow FoV camera, and LUKE, a wide FoV imager with an RGB Bayer pattern filter, that will collect and transmit to Earth several unique images of the effects of the DART impact on the asteroid, such as the formation and the development of the plume potentially determined by the impact.
LICIACube will be the first deep space mission developed and autonomously managed by an Italian team: the design, integration and test of the CubeSat have been assigned by ASI to the aerospace company Argotec, while the LICIACube Ground Segment has a complex architecture based on the Argotec Mission Control Center, antennas of the NASA Deep Space Network and data archiving and processing, managed at the ASI Space Science Data Center. The LICIACube team includes a wide Italian scientific community, involved in the definition of all the aspects of the mission: trajectory design; mission definition (and real-time orbit determination during operations); impact, plume and imaging simulation and modelling, in preparation of a suitable framework for the analysis and interpretation of in-situ data. The major technological mission challenge, i.e. the autonomous targeting and imaging of such a small body during a fast fly-by, to be accomplished with the limited resources of a CubeSat, is affordable thanks to a strong synergy of all the mentioned teams in support of the engineering tasks.
-LICIACube is the first purely Italian spacecraft operating in deep space.-LICIACube is managed by the Italian Space Agency and will be part of the NASA DART mission.-It will analyze the output of the first kinetic impact test at a realistic scale.-The payload is composed by LEIA, a narrow FoV camera, and LUKE, a wide FoV imager with an RGB Bayer pattern filter.-Aims: documenting the DART impact on Dimorphos; characterizing the target shape; performing scientific investigations.
Recurring Slope Lineae (RSL) are narrow, dark features that typically source from rocky outcrops, incrementally lengthen down Martian steep slopes in warm seasons, fade in cold seasons and recur ...annually. In this study we report the first observations of RSL at Hale crater, Mars, during late southern summer by the Color and Surface Science Imaging System (CaSSIS) on board ESA’s ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO). For the first time, we analyze images of RSL acquired during morning solar local times and compare them with High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) observations taken in the afternoon. We find that RSL activity is correlated with the presence of steep slopes. Our thermal analysis establishes that local temperatures are high enough to allow either the melting of brines or deliquescence of salts during the observation period, but the slope and aspect distributions of RSL activity predicted by these processes are not consistent with our observations. We do not find any significant relative albedo difference between morning and afternoon RSL. Differences above 11% would have been detected by our methodology, if present. This instead suggests that RSL at Hale crater are not caused by seeping water that reaches the surface, but are best explained as dry flows of granular material.
•We report the first CaSSIS observations of RSL at Hale crater, Mars.•We compare morning CaSSIS images with afternoon HiRISE observations.•We do not find any relative albedo variations between morning and afternoon RSL.•RSL lengthening is constrained to steep slopes.•Our results indicate that RSL are consistent with dry flows.
ABSTRACT
We monitor the seasonal erosion and accretion of dust deposits in the Imhotep, Hatmehit, and Ma’at regions of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko with OSIRIS Narrow Angle Camera images. The ...vertical accuracy of such measurements is 0.2 m and the spatial scale of the images we used is lower than 0.60 m pixel−1. We calculate the height of 21 boulders by applying a tool that allows to measure the shadow length of a boulder projected on the surrounding dust deposit, assuming that any height variation is not due to boulder intrinsic change. Any boulder height variation provides a direct measurement about the thickness variation of the surrounding dust layer due to the occurring erosion and/or accretion. The analysis concerns the period from 2014 August, inbound to perihelion, to 2016 September, outbound. We measured the erosion in the Ma’at region of 0.6 ± 0.2 m from 2014 September 12 to December 2, and an erosion of 0.4 ± 0.3 m from 2014 December 3 to 2015 February 15. Then, we measured a dust deposition of 0.7 ± 0.3 m during the following perihelion phase, until 2016 May–September. This result confirms the link between the erosion of the Southern hemisphere and the fallout in the northern regions. The Imhotep and Hatmehit regions are characterized by a negligible erosion during the inbound orbit, consistent with pebble-made nucleus models predicting no erosion when the temperature of the nucleus surface is Ts < 205 K.
Aims.
We provide a measurement of the seasonal evolution of the dust deposit erosion and accretion in the Hapi region of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko with a vertical accuracy of 0.2–0.9 m.
...Methods.
We used OSIRIS Narrow Angle Camera images with a spatial scale of lower than 1.30 m px
−1
and developed a tool to monitor the time evolution of 22 boulder heights with respect to the surrounding dust deposit. The tool is based on the measurement of the shadow length projected by the boulder on the surrounding pebble deposit. Assuming the position of the boulders does not change during the observational period, boulder height variations provide an indication of how the thickness of the surrounding dust layer varies over time through erosion and accretion phenomena.
Results.
We measured an erosion of the dust deposit of 1.7 ± 0.2 m during the inbound orbit until 12 December, 2014. This value nearly balances the fallout from the southern hemisphere during perihelion cometary activity. During the perihelion phase, the dust deposit then increased by 1.4 ± 0.8 m. This is interpreted as a direct measurement of the fallout thickness. By comparing the erosion rate and dust volume loss rate at the Hapi region measured in the coma, the fallout represents ~96% in volume of the ejecta. The amount of the eroded pristine material from the southern hemisphere, together with its subsequent transport and fallout on the nucleus, led us to discuss the pristine water ice abundance in comet 67P. We determine that the refractory-to-ice mass ratio ranges from 6 to 110 in the perihelion-eroded pristine nucleus, providing a pristine ice mass fraction of (8 ± 7)% in mass.
A multidisciplinary study of an ancient area of Mars (Early to Late Noachian) located in Arabia Terra is presented, centred at 6°1′N, 354°54′ E and including the 55 km size Vernal crater. By means ...of different spatial scale imagery datasets and digital terrain models (MOLA, THEMIS, HRSC, CTX, CaSSIS and HiRISE), we prepare a high-resolution geological map of the study site. We highlight the different bedrock stratigraphy inside the Vernal crater which is of particular exobiological interest given the presence of putative ancient hot springs, as well as identifying multiple transverse aeolian ridges, inverted fracture networks and paleochannels, mounds, and a 58 m fresh crater located just outside Vernal crater rim. Within all low-latitude regions of Mars, the studied site presents the highest values (up to 16.0 wt%) of water equivalent hydrogen, hence suggesting that there is a widespread presence of in situ subsurface (at maximum depths of 1–2 m) natural resources, such as water ice and/or hydrated minerals. The equatorial location of the area results in the maximum surface temperature and the highest mean solar flux gatherable on the surface of the planet throughout the year. The interesting scientific case, coupled with the presence of in situ exploitable resources and the thorough accomplishment of all landing/roving engineering safety requirements, make the Vernal crater area a strong landing site candidate for future human exploration of Mars.
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•ISRU and Human landing site candidate close to Mars equator.•First high-resolution geological map of Vernal crater and its surroundings.•Ancient hot springs exobiological potential.•In situ subsurface resource identification.•Engineering safety fulfilment and exploration zones characterization.
ABSTRACT
BepiColombo is the fifth cornerstone mission of the European Space Agency (ESA) dedicated to study the Mercury planet. The BepiColombo spacecraft comprises two science modules: the Mercury ...Planetary Orbiter (MPO) realized by ESA and the Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter provided by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. The MPO is composed by 11 instruments, including the ‘Spectrometer and Imagers for MPO BepiColombo Integrated Observatory System’ (SIMBIOSYS). The SIMBIOSYS suite includes three optical channels: a Stereoscopic Imaging Channel, a High Resolution Imaging Channel, and a Visible and near Infrared Hyperspectral Imager. SIMBIOSYS will characterize the hermean surface in terms of surface morphology, volcanism, global tectonics, and chemical composition. The aim of this work is to describe a tool for the radiometric response prediction of the three SIMBIOSYS channels. Given the spectral properties of the surface, the instrument characteristics, and the geometrical conditions of the observation, the realized SIMBIOSYS simulator is capable of estimating the expected signal and integration times for the entire mission lifetime. In the simulator the spectral radiance entering the instrument optical apertures has been modelled using a Hapke reflectance model implementing the parameters expected for the hermean surface. The instrument performances are simulated by means of calibrated optical and detectors responses. The simulator employs the SPICE (Spacecraft, Planet, Instrument, C-matrix, Environment) toolkit software, which allows us to know for each epoch the exact position of the MPO with respect to the planet surface and the Sun.
Abstract
On 2022 September 26, the DART spacecraft will impact the surface of Dimorphos, the ∼160 m size satellite of the binary near-Earth asteroid (NEA) (65803) Didymos. What will be observed on ...the surfaces of both asteroids and at the DART impact site is largely unknown, beyond the details of Didymos revealed by previous Arecibo and Goldstone radar observations. We present here the expected DART and LICIACube observations of the Didymos system and discuss the planned mapping strategies. By searching similar geological features and processes identified on other NEAs, we constrain the impact conditions that DART might encounter at Dimorphos, assessing both the asteroid’s surface and interior structure.
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