Related papers: Propelling Interplanetary Spacecraft Utilizing Wat…
Super-Earths are highly irradiated, small planets with bulk densities approximately consistent with Earth. We construct combined interior-atmosphere models of super-Earths that trace the partitioning of water throughout a planet, including…
STEP (Solar Thermal Electrochemical Production) is an alternative solar energy conversion process. New and original, unpublished STEP results are compared with other STEP results. The STEP process uses semiconductors, solar energy and…
The increasing velocity and frequency of space missions necessitate advancements in spacecraft protection technologies to ensure mission success and the safety of onboard systems and personnel. Existing shielding solutions, including…
Gravity-Assisted maneuvers have been used as a technique to reduce fuel consumption in deep space missions for several decades now. It opened the doors of the exterior solar system. The literature shows those results, as well as new…
The energy transition is also about switching to electricity-based technologies such as heat pumps and electric mobility. They avoid heat as an intermediate step and are therefore much more efficient. This can significantly reduce the…
Mars provides a critical analog to once habitable exoplanets that have since lost their surface liquid water. The current atmospheric state of Mars retains the chemical fingerprints of that transition, including isotopic signatures of…
Nominally anhydrous minerals (NAMs) are the primary carriers of water in rocky planet mantles. Therefore, studying water solubilities of major NAMs in the mantle can help us estimate the water storage capacities of rocky planet mantles and…
We investigate the feasibility of detecting water molecules (H2O) and water ions (H20+) from the Europa plumes from a flyby mission. A Monte Carlo particle tracing method is used to simulate the trajectories of neutral particles under the…
A novel method to pump fluid in lab on chip devices with velocities up to tens of micrometer per second is introduced. A focused laser beam locally heats up an electrolyte. A net charge tends to accumulate in the heat-absorbing area, due to…
Exploration of Mars has been made possible using a series of landers, rovers and orbiters. The HiRise camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has captured high-resolution images covering large tracts of the surface. However, orbital…
The ion-sputtering (IS) process is active in many planetary environments in the Solar System where plasma precipitates directly on the surface (for instance, Mercury, Moon, Europa). In particular, solar-wind sputtering is one of the most…
In contrast to the Earth, where frictional heating is typically negligible, we show that drag mechanisms could act as an important heat source in the strongly-forced atmospheres of some exoplanets, with the potential to alter the…
Within low-mass star formation, water vapor plays a key role in the chemistry and energy balance of the circumstellar material. The Herschel Space Observatory will open up the possibility to observe water lines originating from a wide range…
Atmospheric circulation on tidally-locked exoplanets is driven by the absorption and reradiation of heat from the host star. They are natural heat engines, converting heat into mechanical energy. A steady state is possible only if there is…
Radar and spacecraft observations show the permanently shadowed regions around Mercury's North Pole to contain water ice and complex organic material. One possible source of this material are impacts by interplanetary dust particles (IDPs),…
Lightsails are a highly promising spacecraft concept that has attracted interest in recent years due to its potential to travel at near-relativistic speeds. Such speeds, which current conventional crafts cannot reach, offer tantalizing…
One of the most important subjects of debate in the formation of the solar system is the origin of Earth's water. Comets have long been considered as the most likely source of the delivery of water to Earth. However, elemental and isotopic…
Drying concentrated slurry waste is slow, particularly due to the entrapment and limited accessibility of water entrained between the particles in the slurry. A sailboat evaporator with a root-like structure is a new system that enables…
Future generations of photoelectrodes for solar fuel generation must employ inexpensive, earth-abundant absorber materials in order to provide a large-scale source of clean energy. These materials tend to have poor electrical transport…
Titan, Saturn's largest moon, supports a dense atmosphere, numerous bodies of liquid on its surface, and as a richly organic world is a primary focus for understanding the processes that support the development of life. In-situ exploration…