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Contents Hayabusa (Japan)Dawn (NASA)NEO Background Asteroids and cometsNEOs introductionAre NEOs dangerous?Why space missions?ESA mission studies Deflection precursorDon Quijote conceptSANCHO studyNEOMAP NEOMAPNEOMAP final recommendationsNEOMAP reportOther ESA NEO activities Spaceguard Central NodeOther past studiesMultimedia Multimedia gallery
| | | | | | | | | Rosetta approaching its ultimate destination: Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko | |
Present missions
Rosetta (ESA)
ESA's Rosetta spacecraft was launched on March 2004 to reach, study and finally land on comet Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The mission consists of an orbiter and a small lander, each of which carries a large complement of scientific experiments. After flying past the main-belt asteroids (2867) Steins in September 2008 and (21) Lutetia in July 2010, Rosetta is due to enter orbit around the comet in 2014. A small lander will be released onto the nucleus of the comet to carry out surface investigations. The Rosetta orbiter will spend some 2 years carrying out observations of the nucleus as the comet heads towards the Sun.
To know more: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Rosetta/
| | | JAXA's Hayabusa spacecraft |
Hayabusa (Japan)
Japan has launched in 2003 a particularly ambitious rendezvous mission to a minor body called Hayabusa (it was originally called MUSES-C). It reached the Near-Earth Asteroid (25413) Itokawa in October 2005 and then spent 5 months studying the asteroid. In November 2005 Hayabusa set down briefly to gather a few grams of surface material. Unfortunately a fuel leak has caused unexpected disturbing torque on the spacecraft and loss of ground contact. The project team has now decided to design a new return trajectory that should bring a re-entry capsule containing the surface samples back to Earth in June of 2010.
To know more: http://www.muses-c.isas.ac.jp/
| | Dawn with Vesta and Ceres against Hartmann background | |
Dawn (NASA)
Dawn is a NASA mission launched in 2007. The Dawn mission will undertake a journey in both space and time by traveling to the two oldest and most massive asteroids in our solar system: Vesta, that will be reached in 2011 and Ceres, where Dawn will arrive in 2015.
The mission's science goals are to study and compare these two very different bodies, one cool and wet, the other hot and dry, to understand the conditions and processes in place at the beginning of solar system formation. Dawn's science instruments will measure the asteroids mass, shape, volume, spin state and mineral composition, will determine tectonic and thermal history, magnetism and core size and examine the internal structure of the two minor bodies.
To know more: http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/
http://www-ssc.igpp.ucla.edu/dawn/
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| | Resources NEO dictionaryFAQsMissions to small bodies Past missionsLinks NEO institutionsNEO referencePlanetary Defense Conference 2009ESA Call for Student PapersEncounter 2029
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