Rosetta mission

We might think that the Murchison meteorite would have been studied thoroughly enough in the years since its arrival on Earth. But the results obtained always depend on the performance of the technical resources available in this case, the analytical methods and the apparatus. Thus, it is not really surprising that a new class of amino acid has been discovered in Murchison material diamino acids, such as DL-2,3-diaminopropionic acid, DL-2,4-diaminobutanoic acid etc. These were identified using a new enantioselective GLPC/MS method, which is also being used in analysis of material from the Rosetta mission. 

The Rosetta mission with its planned landing on a comet, with analysis of cometary material (see Sect. 3.2), should provide more information on the occurrence of chiral molecular species in the cosmos (Adam, 2002). The GC-MS apparatus installed in the robotic lander RoLand is also able to separate and analyse chiral organic molecules (Thiemann and Meierhenrich, 2001). 

Laboratory data from two groups (see Sect. 3.2.4) indicate that chiral amino acid structures can be formed in simulations of the conditions present in interstellar space. The experimental results support the assumption that important asymmetrical reactions could have taken place on interstellar ice particles irradiated with circularly polarised UV light. The question as to whether such material was ever transported to the young Earth remains open. But the Rosetta mission may provide important answers on the problem of asymmetric syntheses of biomolecules under cosmic conditions (Meierhenrich and Thiemann, 2004). 

The comet structure model proposed in Figure 6.16 shows clearly that the observation of molecules from Earth must be limited to those molecules present within the coma of the comet, and whilst they originate in part from the structure and composition of the nucleus the molecular observations are of the coma chemistry only. The coma observations will remain until we send a probe to land on the surface of a comet and report back the composition of the core. The Rosetta mission will do just this and we shall see the composition directly from the data it recovers, if successful. 

P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko The comet that the Rosetta mission is scheduled to encounter and then send a probe to land on its surface. 

Rosetta mission The mission to orbit and send a probe to land on the comet 67P/Chur-... 

Evidence for carbynes in comets might come from remote-sensing analyses of the volatile species in the coma of active comets, in particular from the study of carbon-chain molecules abundances [88]. Using narrowband filter photometry, C3 and C2 were detected in amounts that are classified as being typical in comets Hale-Bopp and Halley [89] and as "being depleted in carbon-chain molecules in comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the new target of the ESA ROSETTA mission, and comet LINEAR 1999... 

Rosetta Mission (Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko) Launched on March 2,2004... 

The Rosetta mission imposed very strict requirements on the flight hardware. The electronic components had to withstand a high radiation dose during the more than 10- year flight and had to operate within a wide temperature range and with low power consumption. 

Glassmeier, K.H., Boehnhardt, H., Koschny, D., Kiihrt, E., Richter, I. Rosetta Mission Flying towards the origin of the Solar System. Space Science Reviews 128, 1-21 (2007). doi 10.1007/sl 1214-006-9140-8... 

Space exploration probes have characteristics and needs similar to those of satellites, but are also generally characterized by the existence of a first part of the mission which is to reach the intended destination. The ratio between the duration of the observation mission and the journey is in some cases very low (for example, over 10 years of travel before an observation mission scheduled for about 2 years, such as Rosetta mission). In such cases a failure at 80% of the total planned duration will result in a mission success close to zero, which is veiy different from, for example, a communications satellite that would have worked correctly for 80% of the expected lifespan. 

The Rosetta Mission. The Rosetta spacecraft with the lander Philae is the first spacecraft to include an experiment to detect chiral molecules outside our planet. The spacecraft was named in honor of the Rosetta stone, which allowed Egyptian hierogl5q>hics to be translated, and resulted in... 

Sidebar 3. A. Alice s mirror-image milk Sidebar 3.B. The Rosetta mission... 

Abstract. Cometary nuclei are composed mostly of water ice and mineral grains. When a comet passes near the Sun, several processes modify the subsurface layer of the nucleus which, according to theory, produce more cohesion and stratification. Presently a Rosetta mission is being prepared to comet 46P/Wirtanen. Plans are to land on the nucleus and penetrate its subsurface layer with a mechanical tool (experiment Mupus). Thus, understanding of the processes responsible for the evolution of a cometary nucleus is of key importance for the success of the mission and for interpretation of the results. This work is intended to estimate how quickly the process of grain sintering could modify the outer part of nucleus. The numerical model is adopted from previous work by Kossacki [1] however, at present the evolution of the cometary orbit is included. 

---