... formation of the solar system, is an excellent specimen for the OSIRIS-REx mission to study the composition of primitive volatiles and organics,” said Amy Simon, OVIRS deputy instrument scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt...
... around $74 million, the project cost a fraction of the $671 million NASA spent on its Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft, which launched in 2013. Prior to the deployment of a space station however, the country needs...
... surface. The inner rocky planets are thought to orbit too close to the Sun to have retained many volatiles during formation. Water for example is suspected to exist in large quantities hidden out of sight underground on Mars. But...
... which a much deeper crustal layer extends down to 8 and 11 kilometres. These crustal layers contain a small amount of volatiles but are mostly composed of basaltic rocks – the same type of rock found in vast quantities on the surface...
... to collate data on the martian atmosphere, it differs from past missions such as NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft, by focusing on observations at Mars’ equator; Once at Mars, Hope is programmed to enter an elliptical...
... of the Royal Astronomical Society. “It is possible to seed the required elements with solid cometary matter, that is rich in volatiles. Although, more importantly, the compounds must be reactive and soluble, no matter how they are delivered,” they...