(missions by alphabetical order; verbs in each notice may present a problem of time)
- Launched on: April 7th, 2001
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: na (mission is running, through various extensions, until September 2008; the craft had been working at Mars since February 2002)
- Mission, Features: Mars Odyssey is "the other orbiter" at Mars. As Mars Global Surveyor is studying Mars in the visible and yielding those fabulous views of the Red Planet, Mars Odyssey is more of a spectroscopic tool mapping and monitoring at different wavelengths and in the thermal range. It's Mars Odyssey which found the widespread olivine showing Mars was essentially dry or water ice at both poles
- Route, Remarks: the radiation environment instrument was knocked out by the November 2003 historical solar events. Mars Odyssey has a two-hour orbit that is nearly sun-synchronous, meaning that
the craft passes over the same part of Mars at roughly the same local time each
day
- Status: operating. The worhorse Thermal Emission
Imaging System (THEMIS) is a multi-band camera at infrared
and visible wavelengths as it combines a five-wavelength visual imaging system with a nine-wavelength
infrared imaging system. By comparing daytime and nighttime infrared images of
an area, scientists can determine many of the physical properties of the rocks
and soils on the ground. The team, early 2009, successfully rebooted the craft's computer to address a potential vulnerability of accumulated memory corruption, after the 5-year mission. The Mars Odyssey spacecraft has completed in 2009 an eight-month adjustment of its solar-marching orbit, passing from the Sun at 3:45 to 5 p.m. when the orbiter flies Mars overhead. This change gains sensitivity for infrared mapping of Martian minerals by the orbiter's Thermal Emission Imaging System camera. Orbit design for Odyssey's first seven years of observing Mars used a compromise between what worked best for the infrared mapping and for another onboard instrument. Such a renewed possibility will likely provide to high-quality data about Martian minerals which could had been collected until for some parts of Mars only. The tradeoff is that one of three instruments in Odyssey's Gamma Ray Spectrometer suite will eventually overheat and stop working. The change of the orbit was made through the firing of thrusters during six minutes, putting the orbiter into a "drift" pattern of gradually changing the time-of-day of its overpasses during the next several months. The thrusters were then fired again during 5 and a half minute to stop the drift. The renewal also affected the straight downward-looking by the orbiter with a more-flexible targeting to image some latitudes near the poles that are never directly underneath the orbiter. The Mars Odyssey orbiter also put itself into a safe standby mode in July 2010. The orbiter passed into safe mode on July 12th, 2012 and pointing to Earth as the onboard computer did not reboot by the end of a trajectory correction maneuver. Flight engineers sent commands to re-activate the satellite and reorient it to Mars. The Mars Odyssey orbiter switched to its set of B-side redundant equipment in November 2012, including a main computer, in November 2012 to avoid a possible weathering of a inertial measurement unit of the original set. Of importance, the craft has tweaked its orbit to get a morning-daylight orbit, a move to be completed by November 2015; the Mars Odyssey thus will become the first craft with such a orbit since the 1970's
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: April 25th, 2007, aboard a Pegasus XL, from Vandenberg AFB. The Pegasus XL rocket was released from its Stargazer L-1011 aircraft at a drop point over the Pacific Ocean, 100 miles offshore west-southwest of Point Sur, Calif
- Agency, Country: NASA (Goddard Space Flight Center) (USA)
- Mission Duration: 23 months
- Mission, Features: AIM will study the noctilucent clouds (NLCs), these extremely high altitude, electric blue mesospheric clouds as some think they might be induced by global climat change. Mission is scheduled to last 23 months. Goddard Space Flight Center is managing the mission for NASA
- Route, Remarks: AIM will fly in a polar orbit about 300 miles above Earth
- Status: in its 30-day checkout period
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: na
- Agency, Country: NASA
- Mission Duration: na
- Mission, Features: By mid-2010, two THEMIS craft have been reassigned to a new mission after successfully completing their original science objectives but risking to be overshadowed on their orbits, and renamed ARTEMIS (for 'Acceleration, Reconnection, Turbulence and Electrodynamics of Moon's Interaction with the Sun'). The duo study how solar wind electrifies, alters and erodes the moon's surface and with some implications about other planets of our solar system
- Route, Remarks: Each craft is now a one Lagrangian point each side the Moon, a Earth-moon libration orbit very unstable that requires daily attention and constant adjustments and attained by 2011. That required multi-year-long orbit change plan relying predominantly on gravity assists from the Moon and
Earth and deep space maneuvers, constituting a engineering feat. Optimal places were found where
corrections seemed to require less subsequent fine-tuning as crossed whenever a craft crosses a imaginary line joining Earth and the
Moon, though nothing in theories had predicted such a thing. Thence, both satellites will move closer to the Moon at approximately 62 miles of altitude and then closer
- Status: na
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: October, 15th 1997
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA), ESA (Europe)
- Mission Duration: mission is scheduled for a duration of 4 years in Saturn's system since July 2004
- Mission, Features: study of Saturn and of its moons and rings. The Huygens probe which was transported by Cassini will descend into one of Saturn's moon's (Titan) atmosphere during 153 mn. Cassini is scheduled to stay 4 years in orbit around Saturn
- Route, Remarks: gravity assisted route via four flybies (two at Venus, one at Earth, one at Jupiter). The Huygens probe has been built by the European Space Agency (ESA)
- Status: operating. see our dedicated page about the mission
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: November 26th, 2011, by 10:21 a.m. EST, aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V, from the CCAFS, Kennedy Space Center, Space Launch Complex 41
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: after a landing at Mars on August 6th, 2012, the primary schedule is of one year
- Mission, Features: this mission is a large, six-wheeled rover to the surface of Mars. The rover will explore the red planet during 2 years, searching sites which might harbour life building blocks. Analysis of rocks will be available from a distance through laser pulses. The mission is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., a division of the California Institute of Technology
- Route, Remarks: the Mars Science Laboratory has far more capacities than all the previous rover missions which landed at the surface of Mars, with a radioisotope power supply relieving the craft from reliance on sunshine and able to operate year-round, or being the first craft to be able to adjust its course during the descent into Mars atmosphere, responding to variabilities there, allowing for a smaller landing ellipses (12 miles instead of 40 (20-70 kilometers)) at the surface than previous missions. A new 'skycrane' technology at last, after a parachute slowed the rover's descent toward Mars, lowering the spacecraft on a tether for the final touchdown could accomodate more sloped terrain than, for example, the airbag methode used by the Twin Rovers. Such refinements in technology made more landing sites to qualify for safe. The communications of the mission will be relayed Earth through the Mars Odyssey orbiting mission. Curiosity is about 9 ft (3 m) long and four times as heavy as one of both MER rovers. It is using 10 science instruments to examine rocks, soil and
the atmosphere. A laser will vaporize patches of rock from a distance, and
another instrument will search for organic compounds. Other instruments
include mast-mounted cameras to study targets from a distance, arm-mounted
instruments to study targets they touch, and deck-mounted analytical
instruments to determine the composition of rock and soil samples acquired
with a powdering drill and a scoop. Each of six wheels has a independent drive motor. The
two front and two rear wheels also have individual steering motors. This
steering allows the rover to make 360-degree turns. The large wheels' diameter will help Curiosity roll over obstacles up to 30 inches (75 cm) high.
The 'Sample Analysis at Mars,' or SAM tool, looking for life, will heat samples to about 1,800° F and examine those with a mass spectrometer identifying gases by the molecular weight and electric charge of their ionized state, a laser spectrometer to check elements through absorption of light at specific wavelengths, and a gas chromotograph separating different gases from a mixture. With a improved sensitivity, SAM has a capability to detect less than one
part-per-billion of an organic compound, over a wider mass range of molecules. A lower heat process is also available. The site of landing for Curiosity has been opted for in the summer of 2011, the Gale Crater, near the equator, 96 miles wide and holding a mountain which rises higher from the crater floor than Mount Rainier above Seattle. The mountain holds stacked layers, of them some sulfates. 4 sites had been chosen from Mars scientists and presentations during workshops those late years as NASA selected one through studies by the HiRISE
camera of the current, orbiting MRO mission. As selected by a NASA panel from a U.S.-wide student proposal contest, the Mars Science Laboratory officially got his name, of 'Curiosity', in May 2009
- Status: landed on August 6th, 2012 with a flawless procedure. Halfway to Mars, Curiosity
adjusted its flight path in March 2012 with thrusters ignited for nearly nine minutes. The rover team has also checked the status of Curiosity's science instruments, powering them on for the first time since
before launch. All the instruments passed these checkouts. Two ways of using
thruster engines were performed while the whole spacecraft spins at two rotations per minute.
The spacecraft's cruise stage carries eight thrusters grouped into two sets of
four. The maneuver began with about three minutes of firing one thruster in each
set to change velocity along the direction of the axis of rotation. Then, to
push the spacecraft in a direction perpendicular to the axis, each set of
thrusters was used for five-second pulses when the spacecraft's rotation put
that set at the correct orientation. A first large TCM had been performed in January 2012. Up to four
additional opportunities for fine-tuning, as needed, are scheduled before the
arrival at Mars on Aug. 5, 2012, PDT (Aug. 6, EDT and Universal Time).
The spacecraft's initial trajectory resulting from the launch included an
intentional offset to prevent the upper stage of the launch vehicle from hitting
Mars as it had not been cleaned to
protect Mars from Earth's microbes. By November 2011 the Curiosity mission endure a computer reset which was successfully fixed through a update in February 2012. By June 2012 NASA has narrowed the target for Curiosity. From a landing ellipse approximately 12 miles wide and
16 miles long (20 kilometers by 25 kilometers) mission planners have shrinked the area to
approximately 4 miles wide and 12 miles long (7 kilometers by 20 kilometers),
assuming winds and other atmospheric conditions as predicted, landing close to the slopes of Mount Sharp at the center of the Gale Crater. check more with our dedicated page
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: January 12th, 2005 (Boeing Delta II from Kennedy Space Center, Florida (CCAFS), pad 17-B)
- Agency, Country: NASA (JPL) (USA)
- Launched on: September 27th, 2007 at 7:34 a.m. EDT from Pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, aboard a Delta II rocket
- Agency, Country: NASA (JPL) (USA)
- Mission Duration: Vesta reached in 2011 and left by 2012. Ceres reached in 2015
- Mission, Features: Dawn is a mission to two minor planets, Vesta, and Ceres, orbiting in the asteroid belt, located between Mars and Jupiter. As these planets are leftovers of the solar system's formation and may have endure somehow some phases of the planetary formation process, the mission will yield data allowing to understand the early stages ofthe solar system as well as basic planetary processes
- Route, Remarks: Dawn is a ion thruster propulsed spacecraft. The probe will stay about one year in orbit around each of both minor planets. Due to its impossibility to large thrusts, Dawn, will follow a characteritic spiral orbit, getting gently and progressively further from Sun. The mission will carry a silicon chip containing the names of asteroid, space and enthusiasts from around the world
- Status: Ceres, mission's second target reached. Dawn spacecraft has reached its official approach phase by May 3rd, 2011, to the asteroid Vesta and will begin using
cameras for the first time to aid navigation for an expected July 16 orbital encounter! The approach phase now is to last three months beginning by 752,000 miles (1.21 million km) from Vesta, or about three times the distance between Earth and the Moon, and the spacecraft will spiral gently into orbit around the asteroid as by approximately 9,900 miles (16,000 km) from Vesta, the asteroid's gravity will capture the spacecraft in orbit after more than three-and-a-half years of interplanetary travel. 2015 is the date scheduled for the approach to Ceres. The Mission, by Mar. 21, 2011 had got out of a hibernation of about six months for its navigation and imaging cameras system as the spacecraft also powered up its visible and infrared mapping spectrometer, and the gamma ray and neutron detector as Dawn had continued its way to the asteroid belt, alternating phases of propulsion through its ion engine, coast phases, and gravity-assisted flybys by some planets. To improving imaging plans mission engineers have built in 2011 a digital best guess terrain of Vesta as data taken by the mission will equal best global topography maps of Earth made by
NASA's Shuttle Radar Topography mission. check more with our dedicated page. Vesta is to be left by July 2012 and Ceres is to be reached by February 2015 (40 extra days have been added in April 2012 to Dawn to explore Vesta, until Aug. 26, 2012. Dawn however is still scheduled to arrive to Ceres in February 2015)
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: Feb. 11, 2015 on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space
Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida
- Agency, Country: NASA, NOAA (USA)
- Mission Duration: na
- Mission, Features: DSCOVR is a U.S. NOAA's real-time solar wind monitoring for space weather
alerts and forecasts issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
- Route, Remarks: the mission's orbit position is about one million miles from the Earth
- Status: launched
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: January 12th, 2005 (Boeing Delta II from Kennedy Space Center, Florida (CCAFS), pad 17-B)
- Agency, Country: NASA (JPL) (USA)
- Mission Duration: mission's end occurred in August 2005 as scientists will continue data analysis during 8 months, ending in March 2006. The mission was turned into the EPOXI mission, targeting a comet and exoplanets study
- Mission, Features: Deep Impact was a mission aiming at firing a 39-by-39 inches (1-by-1 meter) impactor unto comet 9P/Tempel 1, on July 4th, 2005 as the craft will observe what ensues from a mere 310 miles (500 km) away checking whether a comet's nucleus is a conglomerate of unprocessed material only or whether there was some differentiation leading to a more consistent surface. The impactor was to separate 24 hours before the impact as the craft will flyby the comet at 300 miles (500 km) at closest. The craft and the comet were to be then 83 million miles (133.6 million km) away from Earth. this part of the mission unfolded successfully. see more at our Special Coverage of the mission
- Route, Remarks: NASA found a new use for the spacecraft scouring the solar system, as the Deep Impact craft, changed into the EPOXI mission, is to overfly comet Hartley 2 by Oct. 11, 2010 (after that the initial target, comet Boethin, had been discarded for cause of not found and risking to break apart) and as the craft will too points its instruments towards some gas giants-type exoplanets. The mission's closest approach to the small half-mile-wide comet will be about 435 miles only, as EPOXI will have performed 3 flybys at the Earth (the Epoxi spacecraft, after one on June 27th, 2010, bringing it on its trajectory to fly past comet Hartley 2, has began imaging the target and scrutinizing it during more than 2 months, with a appointment on Nov. 4, 2010. That will provide the best extended view of a comet
in history during its pass through the inner solar system. see more at our Special Coverage of the flyby
- Status: en route. By November 2011, Deep Impact completed a 140-second firing
of its onboard rocket motors to keep the mission's options open for yet another exploration of
a solar system small body. A rocket burn was performed by October 2012 to keep the craft's
options open for yet another exploration of a solar system small body, maybe a small NEO called 2002 GT
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: June 11, at 12:05 p.m. EDT, aboard a Delta II from the Kennedy Space Center (Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, launch complex 17, pad 17-B)
- Agency, Country: USA
- Mission duration: na
- Mission, Features: the GLAST space telescope, working the gamma-rays, is to study black holes, allowing physicists to the study of subatomic particles at far greater energies than those seen in ground-based particle accelerators, as cosmologists will gain valuable information about the birth and early evolution of the Universe, and obtain a map of the gamma-ray sky
- Route, Remarks: the mission is a partnership between astrophysics and
particle physics, developed in collaboration with NASA and the U.S. Department
of Energy and including important contributions from academic institutions and
partners in France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Sweden, and the USA. The mission has been renamed the 'Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope' in hommage to the famed Italian physicist
- Status: launched
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launch on: Oct. 9, 2011 by 9:08 a.m. EDT (should have been aboard a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta II Heavy, from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., Space Launch Complex 17B)
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Scheduled Arrival Date: na
- Mission Duration: the mission by June 2012, has it original mission was over, has been extended Aug. 30 to Dec. 3, 2012
- Mission, Features: GRAIL is a twin spacecraft mission to the Moon to measure the gravity field in detail. Scientists will use the gravity field information from the two satellites to X-ray the Moon from crust to core to reveal the moon's subsurface structures and, indirectly, its thermal history. The mission takes part into NASA's effort to return man to Moon by the 2020's
- Route, Remarks: both vessels were re-christened 'Ebb and Flow' by Jan. 2012 following a concours among US colleges
- Status: after a three-and-a-half months to reach
lunar orbit, both GRAILs have settled into their lunar orbit by early January 2012 as science phase began in March 2012, as both probes will be in a near-polar, near-circular orbit with an
altitude of about 34 miles (55 kilometers). After a extension, both GRAIL craft were intentionally crashed on Dec. 17, 2012, like planned, into a mountain near the Moon's north pole as the LRO orbiter observed the could dust and gas kicked by the action. The site was in shadow at the time of the impact, so the LRO team had to wait
until the plumes rose high enough to be in sunlight before making the
observation . Spacecraft were
traveling about 3,771 mph (6,070 kilometers per hour) when they hit the surface and they hit two craters which are relatively small, perhaps about 13 to 20 feet (4 to 6 meters)
in diameter with faint ejecta patterns South of Mouchez Crater and northeast of Philolaus Crater. Both
impact craters are about 2,200 meters (roughly 7,218 feet) apart as GRAIL B or Flow impacted about 30 seconds after GRAIL A or Ebb West and North of it
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX)
- Launched: Oct. 19th (instead of Oct. 5th), 2008, aboard a Pegasus XL, air-launched rocket, from the Kwajalein Missile Range -part of the 'Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site'- in the Pacific Ocean
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: na
- Mission, Features: IBEX is a mission specifically designed to map the boundary of the solar system. The mission, orbiting on a high elliptical orbit around Earth, will study the termination shock, where the heliosphere -the solar domain, is separated from the interstellar space, as it will be able to detect the particles of it through its two neutral atom imagers. The mission will study galactic cosmic rays too
- Route, Remarks: -
- Status: launched
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS)
- Launched: Jun. 27th, 2013 at 7:27 p.m. PDT aboard a Pegasus XL, air-launched rocket, from Vandenberg Air Force
Base, Calif.
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: na
- Mission, Features: the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph mission will use a solar telescope and spectrograph to explore the solar chromosphere, that crucial region for understanding energy transport into the solar wind and an archetype for stellar atmospheres
- Route, Remarks: -
- Status: launched
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
Kepler
- Launched on: March 6th, 2009 (one day late to the scheduled date), at 10:49 p.m. EST, aboard a Delta II, from the Kennedy Space Center (Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, launch complex 17, pad 17-B)
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: the mission will last 3 ½ years. It has been extended with four years since 2012
- Mission, Features: Kepler is leaving for the Earth orbit whence it will search exoplanets, and especially Earth-size and smaller planets in or near the habitable zone of their star, the zone where liquid water is allowed at the surface of those. Kepler will perform a extensive search for such planets in the neighbourhood of our Sun only, within a range between 600 and 3,000 light-years, and in the direction of the northwest of constellation Cygnus, the Swan, a region in the Milky Way. and should be decisive if evidencing that planets like ours are extant, which should likely bring a milestone philosophic move. The mission however won't be able to tell whether life is present, or not, at those planets
- Route, Remarks: Kepler basically is a Schmidt telescope, with a 0.95-meter aperture and a 12 degree in diameter field-of-view, with a recording photometer composed of an array of 42 CCDs (charge coupled devices), 50x25 mm each, with a total accuracy of 95 megapixel able to detect tiny changes in a star's brightness of only 20 parts per million. Kepler is to have an Earth-trailing orbit
- Status: Kepler has shown its ability to accurately determine the diameter of a star from the stellar seismology which makes its surface vibrate and its brightness vary. The craft lost two of its four reaction wheels in 2013 bringing to not able to its science as NASA ended any attempt to restore the probe in August 2013 and consider what new science research it can carry out in its current condition. The K2 mission eventually, the two-wheel operation mode officially began collecting data on May 30, 2014
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE)
- Launched on: Sep. 6th, 2013 aboard a Minotaur V, from the Wallops Flight Facility, Va., Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport Pad 0B
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: -
- Mission, Features: As a secondary payload on the mission GRAIL, LADEE is aiming to take ultra-precise gravity field measurements of the moon and observe its tenuous atmosphere or exosphere. Mission is to last 100 days
- Route, Remarks: plans called for the GRAIL and LADEE spacecraft to launch together on a Delta II rocket and separate after they are on a lunar trajectory. LADEE is a cooperative effort with NASA's Ames Research Center, Goddard Space Flight Center, and Marshall Space Flight Center, with the Ames Center managing the mission
- Status: by Nov. 20th, 2013 LADEE was considered fit to work as it entered its planned orbit around Moon's equator -a unique position allowing the probe to make frequent
passes from lunar day to lunar night providing a full scope of the
changes and processes occurring within the Moon's atmosphere. After launch, the craft had quickly ran into reaction wheel troubles. 4 months were scheduled to reach Moon. The mission ended by March 2014 and kept operating in an extended science phase. The craft was eventually intentionally impacted on the surface of Moon on April 17th, 2014 as the spacecraft's
orbit naturally decayed following the mission's final low-altitude science
phase. LADEE made history using a pulsed laser beam to transmit data from the moon to the Earth at a record-breaking download rate of 622
megabits-per-second (Mbps)
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: June 18th, 2009, aboard a Atlas V, launching from the Kennedy Space Center (the launch was delayed to let room to a second launch attempt by the STS-127 Space Shuttle mission)
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: at least one year as far as mapping is concerned, and several more years for science surveys
- Mission, Features: LRO is the first of a series of yearly robotic probes which will pave the way to lunar human missions starting no later than 2020. LRO will orbit the Moon, mapping in high-resolution, sampling the radiation environment, seeking landing sites, water ice, and other useful resources. LRO will map the lunar environment in greater detail than ever before. LRO should work during one year or more in a low, 30-mile only orbit, with its high-resolution camera called "LROC," short for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera. The camera has a resolution of about half a meter, yielding a a half-meter square on the Moon's surface filling a single pixel. The mission was added with an additional concept, as the accessory 'Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite' (LCROSS) will first direct the last stage of the rocket, which will have travelled along with the mission up to the Moon, to crash at the lunar southern pole. The small satellite will study the 38-mile high plume created by the impact from orbit, before it crashes in turn in the same region, created a second plume, this one being studied by the LRO. Both experiments are meant to check weather there is water ice at the Moon's south pole. Both plumes, on the other hand, will be observable too from Earth-based observatories. During the Apollo era, four such stages of the Saturn-V launcher were crashed on the Moon for the purpose of seismic measurement
- Route, Remarks: the LRO is part of the new vision for space developed at NASA. Moon will be a testbed for missions to Mars and beyond. LRO is part of two robotic missions (the next one is a lunar lander scheduled for 2010 in the southern polar regions) which are going to scout for the manned mission bringing man back to Moon
- Status: both the LRO and LCROSS have reached Moon after a 4-day journey. The LRO, after fine-tuning its orbit to reach its work one, between 31 and 135 miles (50 to 218 km), has begun science since October 2009. The LCROSS overflew the southern pole, with the empty Centaur rocket stage, to settle into a polar orbit which will allow those to eventually crash on the Moon by October 9th, 2009, into a shadowed crater at the South pole. As of July 2010, after one year of science at the Moon, the LRO found lunar water ice, varied compounds mixed therein like carbon dioxide, hydrogen, carbon
monoxide and sulfur dioxide, likely collected along the eons of the solar system history. The mission too was able to spot the remains of the Apollo program missions as the topographical work of the LRO is well on the way too. The LRO returned 40 To of data, compared to the few terabytes provided by such mission like the Mars Global Surveyor, or Cassini. Since Sept. 16, 2010, the LRO will turn its attention from exploration (mapping) to science objectives
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: June, 2nd, 2003 (Soyuz rocket; Baikonur)
- Agency, Country: ESA (EU)
- Mission Duration: a Martian year (687 days)
- Mission, Features: collection of data about Mars from orbit by Mars Express and by a lander, Beagle 2, which will land at Isidis Planitia, an equatorial region, and sample rocks and soil
- Route, Remarks: Mars Express will be set on an elliptical, quasi-polar orbit
- Status: operating. Mission's orbiter successfully entered martian orbit on Christmas Day but since this same day lander Beagle-2 has not beamed back Earth. Officials said that in the case lander would be deemed lost mission would remain interesting however. Mission was not expected neither to be impeded due to 70 per cent of solar arrays produced energy being available only
- to the ESA site about Mars Express
- Launched on: August 12th, 2005, 7:43 a.m. EDT, atop a Lockheed Martin Atlas V launcher (this was the first time that an interplanetary mission was using this type of launcher since 1973), from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS), pad 41
- Agency, Country: NASA (JPL) (USA)
- Mission Duration: 5 years and a half. The main mission was considered completed by 2008 and an extension phase is now running until in mid-2010
- Mission, Features: the MRO is an advanced survey mission with more powerful instruments (landscape details, radar assessment of underground layers down to one third of a mile under the surface, search for new water-related minerals and on smaller scales, daily weather), representing a quantum leap in Mars orbital exploration. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter will be scouting for the next wave of robotic explorers (like Phoenix launching in 2007 or the "Mars Science Laboratory"). It is an improvement too about communications as it will be able to beam back a never seen flow of data using its new 3-meter antenna. The orbiter will be used too to relay next missions communications. see a dedicated page about this mission
- Route, Remarks: working orbit has been reached through an aerobraking maneuver during 6 months (the craft was lowered to an altitude where the Mars' atmosphere braked it, then it was slowed along successive orbits, and eventually raised out of the atmosphere when the desired orbit was obtained). The MRO is orbiting 12 times a day around Mars. The MRO, by late 2008, has imaged 40 percent of Mars
- Status: The MRO was plagued by unwanted computer rebooting which interrupted science several times as it may have lost one of the HiRISE instrument's 14 CCDs by September 2011. Science primary mission had ended by November 2008, as the MRO continues to observe Mars both for science and for support of future missions that will land on Mars. As of early 2015, the MRO had orbited Mars more than 40,000 times
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution)
- Launched on: Launched Nov. 18, 2013 aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V, from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., Space Launch Complex 41. Into Martian orbit on September 21, 2014 through a engine burn, pulling the spacecraft
into an elliptical orbit
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: 1 year; definitive orbit around Mercury started in March 2011 after three flybys of the planet in January and October 2008, and September 2009
- Mission, Features: MAVEN, with its 8 instruments, will provide a comprehensive study of the Martian atmosphere, both current and from a historical perspective, answering for example on why and how the Red Planet lost most of its atmosphere. From its minimum 90-mile (145-kilometer) altitude above the surface, the mission will too dip to an altitude of 80 miles (130 km), into Mars' upper atmosphere, to sample it entirely! The mission has a duration of one Earth year
- Route, Remarks: separated from its launcher's second stage 53 minutes after launch. The solar
arrays deployed approximately one hour after launch. MAVEN journeyed on a 10-month interplanetary cruise
- Status: By arrival, MAVEN was to enter into an elliptical orbit ranging 90-3,870 miles (145-6200 km) above the surface. During and after its primary mission, MAVEN may be used like a relay for robotic, surface missions at Mars
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: August, 3rd 2004 at 2:15:56 a.m. EDT from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla. aboard a Delta II Heavy rocket
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: 1 year; definitive orbit around Mercury started in March 2011 after three flybys of the planet in January and October 2008, and September 2009
- Mission, Features: general collection of data about Mercury from orbit. Mission is programmed for one year. Mission is the first to Mercury since Mariner 10 in 1974-1975. Complementing missions to Venus and Mars, it will provide further knowledge about the inner solar system planets, hence about Earth. see a dedicated page about mission
- Route, Remarks: the orbit around Mercury will be extremely elliptical (from 120 miles at its nearest up to 9,000 miles). Mercury flybys will fine-tune and slow MESSENGER's path and allow the craft to gather data which will be used to plan the orbit's phase.
- Status: science is now to begin Apr. 4, 2011 after a successfull insertion burn had occurred on March 17th 2011. Of the three flybys of the planet (January and October 2008, September 2009) and the three gravity-assisted (two at Venus in October 2006 and June 2007, one at Earth in 2005), the craft had performed the following: the three gravity-assisted flybys at Venus and the Earth (the craft flew by Earth at a mere 1,458 mi (2,347 km) of altitude over central Mongolia on August 2nd 2005, as at 210 miles (340 km) above Venus during the second flyby there; the probe was accurately targeted to its first rendezvous to Venus through an engine burn (known like a 'Deep Space Maneuver'), which occurred four months after the passage at the Earth, altering the orbit slightly), and its two first passages at Mercury self (January, and October 2008; the second one unveiled the whole part of the planet unknown until then, flybying Mercury at an altitude of 124 miles (200 km) and a speed of 15,000 mph (9,300 km/h). NASA has added a additional year of orbital operations at Mercury beyond the
planned end of the primary mission on March 17, 2012 allowing for more studies into the new discoveries made at Mercury and to view the innermost planet as solar activity continues to increase toward the
next maximum in the solar cycle
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: March 12th, 2015 aboard a Atlas V421 from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla
- Agency, Country: NASA (Goddard Space Flight Center) (USA)
- Mission Duration: 1 year; definitive orbit around Mercury started in March 2011 after three flybys of the planet in January and October 2008, and September 2009
- Mission, Features: four identically instrumented spacecraft will make coordinated high-resolution observations of the Earth's magnetosphere, helping to understand the effects of the Sun on its solar system environment, hence on the space environment which astronauts en route to faraway worlds will have to endure. The MMS will too endeavour to a better knowledge of the magnetic reconnection process
- Status: launched
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: January 19th, 2006, 2 p.m. EST (19h GMT), atop an Atlas V (Lockheed Martin) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS), pad 41
- Agency, Country: NASA (Applied Physics Lab) (USA)
- Mission Duration: After Pluto is reached by July 2015, the New Horizons probe will head into the Kuiper Belt at destination of new targets
- Mission, Features: New Horizons is a Pluto-Kuiper Belt mission and the first planetary mission ever to Pluto. The craft will first visit Pluto and its moon Charon, providing the first surface high-resolution images of these worlds and studying their atmosphere. It might then visit one or more Kuiper Belt Objects in the region beyond Neptune. Such bodies are typically 62 mi (100 km) wide and are thought to be the building blocks of the solar system 4.5 billion years ago. Their surface and their atmospheres will be studied. The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md. is managing the mission for NASA. see a dedicated page about the mission
- Route, Remarks: the mission will use a gravity assist flyby at Jupiter in February 2007, making some science passing there. It should reach the faraway Pluto in July 2015 only with a flyby at Jupiter and in 2020 without it!
- Status: the mission performed a flyby at Jupiter by February 2007 and took the opportunity to make observations of the gas giants and its four Galilean satellites. The discovery of a whole system of moons around Pluto will allow to refine the mission's trajectory as some hypothetize that those moons could have resulted from a collision billion years ago and that a lot of fragments could be lurking around the planet and pose a hazard to New Horizons. New Horizons traversed the orbit of Neptune by late August 2014 after a record journey of
eight years and eight months and that was the very day that Voyager 2 flew past Neptune 25 years ago ew Horizons performed, like planned, its gravity-assisted flyby at Jupiter last February 28th, 2007, giving itself a boost in speed, with a speed after the flyby of past 52,000 mph (83,600 km/h), from an original 43,000 (69,100 km/h)!
The year 2010 represents a major milestone for the mission: the craft should be briefly waken on Jan. 5 for 10 days of light maintenance and tracking activities. By Feb. 25, the probe will have covered half of the actual travel distance of its trip to Pluto. On April 20, it will be at the midpoint between the Sun and its rendezvous point with Pluto, or on Oct. 17, the spacecraft will reach the midpoint of its flight time to Pluto, with five more years to go
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launch on: Jun. 13, 2012 aboard a Orbital Pegasus from the Kwajalein launch site (or the Reagan Test Site, Kwajalein Atoll) as a March 15, 2012 launch status meeting have decided to reschedule the flight to allow
additional time to confirm the flight software used by the launch vehicle's
flight computer will issue commands to the rocket as intended
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Scheduled Arrival Date: na
- Mission, Features: NuSTAR is an is an X-ray observatory, which will search out black holes in our own Milky Way Galaxy and in the distant reaches of the Universe. It will investigate supernovae too
- Route, Remarks: NuSTAR will be followed in 2018 with the 4-X-ray telescope Constellation X mission. NuStar features a 30-foot (10-m) mast that deploys after launch to separate the optics modules from the detectors in the focal plane
- Status: the mission was extended two years starting August 2014
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
Radiation Belt Storm Probes (RBSP)
- Launch on: Aug. 30 2012 at 4:05 a.m.
EDT from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., Space Launch Complex 41 aboard a Atlas V-401
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Scheduled Arrival Date: -
- Mission, Features: The Radiation Belt Storm Probes mission will help us understand the
Sun's influence on Earth and Near-Earth space by studying the Earth's radiation
belts on various scales of space and time
- Route, Remarks: the RBSP mission was renamed the Van Allen Probes to honor the scientist who helped launch the field of magnetospheric science, as of November 2012
- Status: launched
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: March, 2nd 2004
- Agency, Country: ESA (Europe)
- Scheduled Arrival Date: May 2014
- Mission, Features: Rosetta is a mission to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It will be the first mission ever landing on a comet. After having reached the comet about 450 million kilometers from the Sun, Rosetta orbiter will image Churyumov-Gerasimenko during 18 months accompanying the comet approaching Sun and developping a tail. The Philae harpoon-firing lander will have been released and landed on the comet. Mission is to study pristine material which comets are made of; such material dates back to early stages of our solar system. En route, Rosetta will visit two main-belt asteroids: 2867 Steins in September 2008, 21 Lutetia in July 2010
- Route, Remarks: flybys of Mars (2007) and the Earth (2005, 2007 and 2009). Journey to the four-kilometer (2.5-mile) wide comet will take 10½ years. Three instruments are NASA-funded and will be used to study comet from the orbiter
- Status: in orbit around comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko since Aug. 6, 2014. Rosetta was reactivated Jan. 20, 2014 after a record 957 days in hibernation. Rosetta caught a first glimpse of its destination comet by March 2014. check our page dedicated to the mission
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: February 12th, 2010, aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V, from the Kennedy Space Center (Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, launch complex 41)
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Scheduled Arrival Date: na
- Mission, Features: as part of the 'Living With a Star' (LWS) program the SDO will study the interaction between our Sun and our Earth. The mission will take the most detailed ever pictures of the Sun as they will be in 3D further. Data will be available too to the public through a Iphone application which will air too pictures from other solar probes
- Route, Remarks: the SDO will be placed on an inclined geosynchronous orbit. SDO is enduring a so-called eclipse when flying for up to 72 minutes each day behind Earth, during two eclipses seasons every year (SDO's 'semi-annual eclipse season' is a time when Earth blocks the telescope’s
view of the Sun for a period of time each day which needs a refocusing through heaters, due to thermal lens flex)
- Status: after a period of two months of tests and calibration, the mission is now performing like planned
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: August, 25th, 2003
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: the mission has been extended for two years since 2012
- Mission, Features: SIRTF is a spatial observatory in the infrared; the SIRTF is dubbed the "son of Hubble" as, as Hubble is working mainly in the visible wavelength (even if it may capture infrared pictures), the SIRTF will work in the infrared. The telescope was given the new name of 'Spitzer Space Telescope' by then end of 2008, from Lyman Spitzer. JPL manages the Spitzer Space Telescope for NASA.
- Route, Remarks: the orbit of SIRTF will be peculiar in that it will trail behind Earth's orbit, on the orbit (to avoid the warmth of Earth), the distance to the planet lengthening all along the mission (by 0.1 AU a year)
- Status: operating. The Spitzer Space Telescope first images were released on December, 18th 2003. The Spitzer Space Telescope, since May 15, 2009, exhausted the coolant needed to keep its instruments chilled. The telescope since is operating in a
so-called "warm" mode, with a temperature still quite cold at 30° Kelvin and one of the science programs being to survey about 700 near-Earth
objects for their composition and aspect
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: October 26th, 2006, from the CCAFS at the Kennedy Space Center aboard a Delta II
- Agency, Country: NASA (Goddard Space Flight Center) (USA)
- Mission duration: -
- Mission, Features: STEREO is a twin satellites mission about the flow of energy and matter from the Sun to the Earth. Due to its revolutionary concept of two satellites for the same mission and each seeing the Sun 180 degrees apart, STEREO will allow a 3-D view of coronal mass ejections (CMEs). STEREO will provide unique alerts about Earth-directed CMEs. The twin STEREO spacecraft each carry two instruments and two instrument suites, including the Sun Earth Connection Coronal and Heliospheric Investigation (SECCHI). SECCHI consists of an extreme ultraviolet imager (EUVI), two visible-light coronagraphs (COR-1 and COR-2), and a heliospheric imager (HI). The SWAVES instrument, also included in the STEREO payload, are able to detect the radio bursts
- Route, Remarks: both satellites will drift away from Earth on an heliocentric orbit, one leading (STEREO-A) and one lagging (STEREO-B) Earth. They will reach their location through an orbit around the Moon
- Status: the mission has been extended
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: Nov. 20, 2004 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) aboard a Delta II launcher
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: 2 years
- Mission, Features: Swift should definitively solve the question of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Its embarked three telescopes will relay any burst's location allowing both ground- and space-bases telescopes to observe the GRB's afterglow. GRBs are high energy transient events and they are now mostly seen like extreme supernovae events. They are radiating enormous bursts of gamma-rays
- Route, Remarks: GRBs afterglows are rapidly fading preventing ground observatories from any study. A program called the Gamma-ray burst Coordinates Network (GCN) was put up by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. It's notifying a network of observers of the GRBs events. The program was working with the HETE-2 satellite and others. Swift is the next generation spacecraft about GRBs. It will work too with the GCN. Swift will monitor 1/6th of the sky at a time. Further, the craft is equipped with too smaller telescopes (one in the X-ray, the other in the ultraviolet and the visible) which will be "swiftly" turned to the source by the alert telescope which spots the gamma-rays. Swift is managed for NASA by the Goddard Space Flight Center. It's in a 600-km high orbit
- Status: launched; calibrating
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: February 17th, 2007 from Pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla aboard a Boeing Delta II
- Agency, Country: NASA (Goddard Space Flight Center) (USA)
- Mission Duration: na
- Mission, Features: THEMIS is a five small satellites mission which is aimed to make science about Northern lights. Mission will decide which explanation is correct about how auroras are triggered. Auroras are violent "substorms" linked to major reconfigurations of near-Earth space. They have significant implications about space weather (satellites, terrestrial communications)
- Route, Remarks: THEMIS is part of NASA "Explorer Program" which is designed to provide frequent, low-cost access to space for physics and astronomy missions with small to mid-sized spacecraft. This program is managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. By mid-2010, two THEMIS craft have been reassigned to a new mission after risking to overshadowed at their orbit
- Status: working
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: first rover (Spirit) on June, 10th 2003; second rover (Opportunity) on July, 6th 2003
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Mission Duration: 3 months. The mission has been extended five times now, with the mission possibly lasting through 2009
- Mission, Features: MER mission is a twin rovers mission exploring Mars in quest of a watery and life-friendly past. One rover (Spirit) is at Gusev Crater, 15° south of the equator, the other (Opportunity) is at Meridiani Planum (2° south of the equator)
- Route, Remarks: -
- Status: operating. Twins Rovers are working on Mars. see our Special Coverage of the mission
- for more check at NASA site for their dedicated page to that mission, as their Mission Finder is a useful tool
- Launched on: Dec. 14, 2009 at 9:09 a.m. EST, aboard a Delta II 7320 from the Vandenberg Air Force Base, launch pad SLC 2
- Agency, Country: NASA (USA)
- Scheduled Arrival Date: na
- Mission Duration: na
- Mission, Features WISE is part of NASA's medium-sized missions Explore Program. It's an infrared space telescope aimed at a basic reconnaissance of the universe in the mid-infrared wavelengths, providing a vast storehouse of knowledge that will endure for decades. Nearby brown dwarfs, protoplanetary disks, and colliding galaxies are the targets. WISE will also provide NASA's future James Webb Space Telescope with a comprehensive list of targets as WISE, further will be able to reveal darker asteroids, mapping the locations and sizes of roughly 200,000 asteroids and giving scientists a clearer idea of how many large and potentially dangerous asteroids are nearby
- Route, Remarks: JPL will manage WISE for NASA as the telescope will be built by the Space Dynamics Laboratory, Logan, Utah, and the spacecraft by Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corporation, Boulder, Colorado. The Explorer Program is managed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. The Infrared Astronomy Satellite
made the first all-sky map in infrared wavelength in 1983
- Status: WISE primary mission had been considered completed by July 17, 2010 with more than 1.5 million snapshots uncovering hundreds of millions of objects. WISE is now continuing a second survey of about one-half the sky helping to identify new and nearby objects, as well as those that have changed in brightness. That renewed mission is called the NEOWISE Post-Cryogenic Mission, working with two of four infrared detectors due to the runout of the cryogenic coolant. As of early February 2011, NEOWISE already had finished its extended mission and discovered 20 comets, more than 33,000
asteroids in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter, and 134 near-Earth objects (NEOs). Now that NEOWISE has successfully completed a full sweep of the main asteroid
belt, the WISE spacecraft will go into hibernation mode and remain in polar
orbit around Earth, where it could be called back into service in the future. In addition to discovering new asteroids and comets, NEOWISE also confirmed the
presence of objects in the main belt that had already been detected. In just one
year, it observed about 153,000 rocky bodies out of approximately 500,000 known
objects. Those include the 33,000 that NEOWISE discovered.
NEOWISE also observed known objects closer and farther to us than the main belt,
including roughly 2,000 asteroids that orbit along with Jupiter, hundreds of
NEOs and more than 100 comets. The findings will lead to a much-improved picture of the
various asteroid populations. NEOWISE data on the asteroid and comet orbits are catalogued at the NASA-funded
International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center at the Smithsonian Astrophysical
Observatory in Cambridge, Mass. WISE all-sky infrared catalog and atlas showing more than a half billion stars, galaxies and
other object, as released in March 2012, joins the pantheon of
great sky surveys. Individual WISE exposures have been combined into an atlas of more than
18,000 images covering the sky and a catalog listing the infrared properties of
more than 560 million individual objects found in the images. The WISE data processing and archiving
effort is due to the Infrared and Processing Analysis Center at the California
Institute of Technology in Pasadena. WISE was further extended for 3 years beginning in Sep. 2013 to discover about 150 previously
unknown NEOs and characterize about
2,000 others of which some which could candidates for the NASA's asteroid initiative
- to the official site
Website Manager: G. Guichard, site 'Amateur Astronomy,' http://stars5.6te.net. Page Editor: G. Guichard. last edited: 4/5/2015. contact us at geguicha@outlook.com
