This minor rover will journey shotgun on Japan’s ambitious Mars moon sample-return mission
A little rover designed in Europe has arrived in Japan in preparing for its voyage to Mars.
The autonomous 55-pound (25-kilogram) rover is termed IDEFIX and is part of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) Martian Moon Exploration (MMX) probe that aims to acquire samples of the Mars’ moon, Phobos.
The very little, 4-wheeled rover lately arrived in Japan, in accordance to a Feb. 26 post on X (previously regarded as Twitter) created by the MMX mission account.
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IDEFIX, named for the tiny white pet in the Asterix comics, was jointly created by the German Aerospace Middle (recognized by the German acronym DLR) and the French space company Centre Nationwide d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES).
Following a extensive journey from Europe, the MMX rover IDEFIX (developed by @DLR_EN/@CNES) has arrived in Japan! We share in the team’s gleeful “Yatta!/Tadaa!” as the rover is unpacked 📦🤩 An formal handover will just take spot just after post-transport checks 🇯🇵🇫🇷🇩🇪 Welcome to Japan, IDEFIX! pic.twitter.com/y2CXed8ya8February 26, 2024
The key MMX spacecraft aims to get .35 ounces (10 grams) of Phobos’ materials in 2029. It will then deliver the important cargo towards Earth arrival is expected to happen in 2031. IDEFIX will enjoy a section in this in general objective by landing on Phobos first and collecting crucial data in preparing for the landing of the major spacecraft. The rover will also review the Martian moon’s floor composition and texture at chosen locations, according to DLR — if it can land and function productively in a around zero-gravity environment all by by itself, that is.
“The greatest challenge for IDEFIX is that it has to carry out numerous functions — especially the uprighting after landing on Phobos — fully autonomously in order to endure,” Stéphane Mary, CNES Challenge Manager for IDEFIX, reported in a DLR assertion. “It wouldn’t endure if it waited for commands from Earth to arrive.”
A essential goal of MMX is to identify irrespective of whether Phobos and its fellow Martian satellite Deimos are captured asteroids or a coalescence of fragments that ended up blown into orbit following a big impact struck Mars.
MMX was originally scheduled to launch in September of this calendar year, nonetheless uncertainties more than the readiness of the new Japanese H3 rocket meant JAXA took the selection to delay the mission until the up coming Mars launch window in 2026.
H3 has considering the fact that achieved Earth orbit for the first time, bouncing back again from the failure of its debut launch in 2023. The mission will start on an H3 rocket from Tanegashima Space Centre in 2026, ideally arriving in Mars orbit in 2027 to start out mapping and examining Deimos and Phobos. IDEFIX and the major MMX spacecraft will then be in a position to land on Phobos in 2029.