Related papers: Volatile Sample Return in the Solar System
Recent miniaturization of electronics in very small, low-cost and low-power configurations suitable for use in spacecraft have inspired innovative small-scale satellite concepts, such as ChipSats, centimeter-scale satellites with a mass of…
Exoplanets mass measurements will be a critical next step to assess the habitability of Earth-like planets: a key aspect of the 2020 vision in the previous decadal survey and also central to NASA's strategic priorities. Precision astrometry…
The determination of the abundance of volatiles in extrasolar planets is very important as it can provide constraints on transport in protoplanetary disks and on the formation location of planets. However, constraining the internal…
The exploration of small body asteroids provides direct access to the primitive building blocks of our solar system. Sample and return missions enable chemical and radioisotope studies which not only provide evidence for the formation of…
There is ever growing demand for satellite constellations that perform global positioning, remote sensing, earth-imaging and relay communication. In these highly prized orbits, there are many obsolete and abandoned satellites and components…
In recent years a paradigm shift has occurred in exoplanet science, wherein low-mass stars are increasingly viewed as a foundational pillar of the search for potentially habitable worlds in the solar neighborhood. However, the formation…
Orbital debris is a pressing problem which presents a danger to global space operations and a barrier to continued development of the space economy and space infrastructure. As research continues regarding orbital debris, there is a need…
The rapid launch of hundreds of thousands of satellites into Low Earth Orbit will significantly alter our view of the sky and raise concerns about the sustainability of Earth's orbital space. A new framework for sustainable space…
While the data analysis of $\gamma$-ray telescopes has now become more robust, some signals may be misinterpretations of a time-variable foreground emission from the Solar System, induced by low-energy cosmic-ray interactions with…
Surface-bound exospheres facilitate volatile migration across the surfaces of nearly airless bodies. However, such transport requires that the body can both form and retain an exosphere. To form a sublimation exosphere requires the surface…
Ongoing investigations to introduce software techniques suitable to support new experimental requirements for multi-scale simulation are discussed.
For over half a century, scientists have contemplated the potential existence of life within the clouds of Venus. Unknown chemistry leaves open the possibility that certain regions of the Venusian atmosphere are habitable. In situ…
Determining the habitability of terrestrial exoplanets is a complex problem that represents the next major step for the astrophysical community. The majority of current models treat these planets as homogeneous or contain heterogeneity that…
As a response to the white paper call, we propose to turn Kepler to the South Ecliptic Pole (SEP) and observe thousands of large amplitude variables for years with high cadence in the frame of the Kepler-SEP Mission. The degraded pointing…
Spectra of exoplanet atmospheres provide us the opportunity to improve our understanding of these objects just as remote sensing in our own solar system has increased our understanding of the solar system bodies. The challenge is to…
Isotopic ratios provide a powerful tool for understanding the origins of materials, including the volatile and refractory matter within solar system bodies. Recent high sensitivity observations of molecular isotopologues, in particular with…
Small bodies, the unaccreted leftovers of planetary formation, are often mistaken for the leftovers of planetary science in the sense that they are everything else after the planets and their satellites (or sometimes just their regular…
We present a study of an impacting descent probe that increases the science return of spacecraft orbiting or passing an atmosphere-less planetary body of the solar system, such as the Galilean moons of Jupiter. The descent probe is a…
Understanding planetary habitability is one of the major challenges of the current scientific era, particularly given the discovery of a large and diverse terrestrial exoplanet population. Discerning the primary factors that contribute to…
Future missions to Mars and Venus will make use of aerobraking and aerocapture in order to gain mass through the saving of fuel at planetary arrival. So far only aerobraking has been demonstrated, if the Mars Premier project has paved the…