Preliminary Mission Analysis and Orbit Design for Next Mars Exploration
Trans. JSASS Aerospace Tech. Japan Vol. 8, No. ists27, pp. Tk_7-Tk_12, 2010 Topics Preliminary Mission Analysis and Orbit Design for Next Mars Exploration By Naoko OGAWA 1), Mutsuko Y. MORIMOTO1), Yuichi TSUDA1,2), Tetsuya YAMADA1,2), Kazuhisa FUJITA1,3), Tomohiro YAMAGUCHI4), Yasuhiro KAWAKATSU1,2), Takashi KUBOTA1,2) and Jun’ichiro KAWAGUCHI1,2) 1)JAXA Space Exploration Center, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Sagamihara, Japan 2)Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Sagamihara, Japan 3)Aerospace Research and Development Directorate, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Tokyo, Japan 4)The Graduate University for Advanced Studies, Sagamihara, Japan (Received July 21st, 2009) Japan has launched many interplanetary spacecraft for exploration of solar system bodies including Mars. Now we are planning the next Mars mission in the late 2010’s. This paper describes the preliminary mission analysis and orbit design for this plan. The combined exploration by several spacecraft requires complicated and careful consideration, different from those for single-probe missions. Mission plans to realize required configuration by a single launch and simple simulation results are reported. Key Words: Mars, Mission Analysis, Orbit Design, MELOS 1. Introduction 2.1.1. Meteorological orbiter for martian climate One orbiter of the two, called hereafter as the meteorological In 2008, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) orbiter, aims understanding of the interaction between the has established a novel working group toward a novel Mars atmosphere and subsurface ice, and atmospheric dynamics. exploration program named MELOS, an acronym for “Mars Global, high-resolution and continuous mapping of water vapor, Exploration with Lander-Orbiter Synergy”1). As its name clouds, dusts and atmospheric temperature will be performed indicates, this is an ambitious mission composed of several with imaging cameras from the apoapsis of its highly elliptic landers and orbiters, schematically illustrated in Fig.
[Show full text]