Related papers: Volatile Sample Return in the Solar System
It is now accepted that the Solar system's youth was a dynamic and chaotic time. The giant planets migrated significant distances to reach their current locations, and evidence of that migration's influence on the Solar system abounds. That…
Due to the exquisite photometric precision, transiting exoplanet discoveries from the Kepler mission are enabling several new techniques of confirmation and characterization. One of these newly accessible techniques analyzes the phase…
The number of planetary satellites around solid objects in the inner Solar System is small either because they are difficult or unlikely to form, or that they do not survive for astronomical timescales. Here we conduct a pilot study on the…
Static structure models, which map mass-radius constraints to bulk planet composition, are frequently used to categorise exoplanets due to their computational efficiency and the high-level insight they offer into planetary properties.…
Transmission spectroscopy during planetary transits is expected to be a major source of information on the atmospheres of small (approximately Earth-sized) exoplanets in the next two decades. This technique, however, is intrinsically…
In this report, we present the system design, operational strategy, and results of coordinated multi-vehicle field demonstrations of autonomous marine robotic technologies in search-for-life missions within the Pacific shelf margin of Costa…
Energy harvesting is the fundamental activity in almost all forms of space exploration known to humans. So far, in most cases, it is not feasible to bring, along with probe, spacecraft or rover suitable supply of fuel to cover all mission's…
ESA and NASA are studying projects having a tremendous return on variable star research. Other national space agencies are also studying or developing projects of smaller costs but with impressive returns. The projects range from global…
A vast array of transformative technologies developed over the past decade has enabled measurement and perturbation at ever increasing scale, yet our understanding of many systems remains limited by experimental capacity. Overcoming this…
The evolution of space technology in recent years, fueled by advancements in computing such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), has profoundly transformed our capacity to explore the cosmos. Missions like the James…
Our understanding of the processes that are relevant to the formation and maintenance of habitable planetary systems is advancing at a rapid pace, both from observation and theory. The present review focuses on recent research that bears on…
Laboratory experiments play a key role in deciphering the chemistry of the interstellar medium (ISM) and the role that product complex organic molecules (COMs) may play in the origins of life. However, to date, most studies in experimental…
In this paper, we assess the scientific promise and technology feasibility of distributed instruments for planetary science. A distributed instrument is an instrument designed to collect spatially and temporally correlated data from…
Finding and characterizing extrasolar Earth analogs will rely on interpretation of the planetary system's environmental context. The total budget and fractionation between C-H-O species sensitively affect the climatic and geodynamic state…
Solar sails enable missions to observe the solar environment from unique vantage points, such as sustained observations away from the Sun-Earth line; sub-L1 station keeping; high inclination solar orbits; Earth polar-sitting and…
A close partnership between people and partially autonomous machines has enabled decades of space exploration. But to further expand our horizons, our systems must become more capable. Increasing the nature and degree of autonomy - allowing…
Mars exploration motivates the search for extraterrestrial life, the development of space technologies, and the design of human missions and habitations. Here we seek new insights and pose unresolved questions relating to the natural…
Single spacecraft missions do not measure the pristine solar wind continuously because of the spacecrafts' orbital trajectory. The infrequent spatiotemporal cadence of measurement fundamentally limits conclusions about solar…
This paper presents the first structured evaluation of Solar System bodies hypothetically relocated to Earth orbit (1 AU) to assess their potential as alternative habitats. Using comparative criteria, planetary size and gravity, atmospheric…
This paper is concerned with the inverse problem to recover the scalar, complex-valued refractive index of a medium from measurements of scattered time-harmonic electromagnetic waves at a fixed frequency. The main results are two…