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Aerocapture is a maneuver which uses aerodynamic drag to slow down a spacecraft in a single pass through the atmosphere. All planetary orbiters to date have used propulsive orbit insertion. Aerocapture is a promising alternative, especially…
Autonomous exploration of unknown space is an essential component for the deployment of mobile robots in the real world. Safe navigation is crucial for all robotics applications and requires accurate and consistent maps of the robot's…
In this paper we preliminarily explore the possibility of designing a dedicated satellite-based mission to measure the general relativistic gravitomagnetic Lense-Thirring effect in the gravitational field of Mars. The focus is on the…
Deciphering the genesis and evolution of the Martian polar caps can provide crucial understanding of Mars' climate system. The growing scientific interest for the exploration of Mars at high latitudes, and the need of minimizing the…
The Artemis program requires robotic and crewed lunar rovers for resource prospecting and exploitation, construction and maintenance of facilities, and human exploration. These rovers must support navigation for 10s of kilometers (km) from…
Mapping and exploration of a Martian terrain with an aerial vehicle has become an emerging research direction, since the successful flight demonstration of the Mars helicopter Ingenuity. Although the autonomy and navigation capability of…
The capability of maintaining two satellites in precise relative position, stable in a celestial coordinate system, would enable major advances in a number of scientific disciplines and with a variety of types of instrumentation. The common…
Airborne dust plays an active role in determining the thermal structure and chemical composition of the present-day atmosphere of Mars and possibly the planet's climate evolution over time through radiative--convective and cloud…
The continued exploration of Mars will require a greater number of in-space assets to aid interplanetary communications. Future missions to the surface of Mars may be augmented with stationary satellites that remain overhead at all times as…
The ability to traverse an unknown environment is crucial for autonomous robot operations. However, due to the limited sensing capabilities and system constraints, approaching this problem with a single robot agent can be slow, costly, and…
The space challenges do exist at every stride on a human expedition to Mars that arise due to galactic natural phenomena and artificial technologies. This paper emphasizes on Mars orbital and planetary challenges encountered from orbit to…
The paper proposes a reliable and robust planning solution to the long range robotic navigation problem in extremely cluttered environments. A two-layer planning architecture is proposed that leverages both the environment map and the…
The ExoMars mission of the program Aurora (ESA) aims to send a vehicle (Rover) on Mars in 2013. Beyond the technological aspects of the mission, the Rover will also carry scientific instruments for the analysis of Mars subsurface to search…
The wide availability of Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) electronics that can withstand Low Earth Orbit conditions has opened avenue for wide deployment of CubeSats and small-satellites. CubeSats thanks to their low developmental and launch…
A potential Mars Sample Return (MSR) architecture is being jointly studied by NASA and ESA. As currently envisioned, the MSR campaign consists of a series of 3 missions: sample cache, fetch and return to Earth. In this paper, we focus on…
This work introduces a novel approach for Titan exploration based on soft morphing aerial robots leveraging the use of flexible adaptive materials. The controlled deformation of the multirotor arms, actuated by a combination of a pneumatic…
The analysis of the surface texture from the particle (grain size, shape and internal structure) to its organization (surface roughness) provides information on the geological processes. CRISM multi-angular observations (varied emission…
This paper presents a strategy for optimal manoeuvre design of multi-satellite formation flying in low Earth orbit environment, with the aim of providing a tool for mission operation design. The proposed methodology for formation flying…
Characterizing the Martian atmosphere is an essential objective to understand its meteorology and its climate. The lower atmosphere (< 40 km) and middle atmosphere (40-80 km) of Mars appear dynamically coupled at much higher levels than in…
After the successful landing of the Mars Science Laboratory rover, both NASA and ESA initiated a selection process for potential landing sites for the Mars2020 and ExoMars missions, respectively. Two ellipses located in the Mawrth Vallis…