EPOXI Mission News Options

[Paolo]

Spaceflight Now seems to have picked up our chatter: Deep Impact sets path for asteroid encounter in 2020

[Decepticon]

Yikes! 2020.

[Rich]

FYI, all EPOXI data has now been released in PDS here:

http://pdssbn.astro.umd.edu/holdings/di-c-...6-doc-set-v3.0/

Enjoy.

~Rich

[Rich]

Hello everyone,

In case anyone is interested, EPOXI is looking for an intern to help out with web development. We are creating a web interface for science sequence generation and could certainly use the help of a skilled software engineer. The details listed on the JPL internship webpage are scant, but I'll be happy to field questions. I'm trying get some more information added to the job description. Look for AO# 1494 here:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/education/index.cfm?page=316

~Rich

[Paolo]

David Fischer (@cosmos4u) has tweeted this a few hours ago:

Just see that ESA supports a proposal to NASA for parallel observations of comet C-G by Rosetta and Deep Impact in 2015.

details anyone?

[Paolo]

an update on our almost forgotten friend
http://epoxi.umd.edu/1mission/status.shtml

Over the last year, the Deep Impact eXtended Investigation (DIXI) science team has been working primarily on the calibration and interpretation of the Hartley 2 data collected back in November 2010. Many research papers have been written and we anticipate publication of a special issue of the journal Icarus later this year with many of those papers. These papers include studies of: the thermal properties of the nucleus of Hartley 2, the shape and mass-loss of the nucleus of Hartley 2, the excited rotational state of Hartley 2 and how it could be influenced by the mass loss, the physical properties of the large, and the icy grains discovered around Hartley 2's nucleus. The special issue will also contain a few papers from Stardust-NExT that had its flyby of Tempel 1 in Feb 2011 to include the interpretation of the impact location made by Deep Impact (as observed by Stardust-NExT a full orbital period later), and so on. We have also written a broader paper on the volatiles in comets, triggered by our own observations of CO2, and how this implies a different formation scenario for comets. Details of a few of these papers will be provided in a later update.

We have also spent time this year using the DI Flyby spacecraft as an observatory. Among other things, we observed comet 2009 P1 Garradd from a distance of 1.4 AU. 1 AU is ~150,000,000 km, so our observations of Garradd were much farther away than our ~700 km flyby distance of Hartley 2 (we don't have enough fuel to go to any more comets, unless of course one is discovered that will come very close to us). Even at that distance, we determined that Garradd's outgassing varies with a period of 10.4 hours, presumably due to rotation of its nucleus. We also obtained the only measurements of its dry ice content, roughly 10% of its water ice content by number of molecules.

The spacecraft has been in an unusual state during the past year, without an official mission, while waiting for NASA's Senior Review of most of the planetary missions requesting extended operations. That review took place at the end of June and we hope to hear in the next month or two whether we will be allowed to continue operating as an observatory, both observing selected comets as we did with Garradd and also carrying out other observational programs on Mars, Jupiter, and exoplanets producing micro-lensing events by passing in front of a star.

[Paolo]

more infos on Deep Impact/EPOXI observations of comet Garradd
http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/iau/cbet/0.../CBET003090.txt

[Paolo]

abstract of a presentation to this year's DPS meeting on scheduled observations of Deep Impact's target asteroid 2002 GT

Observing Campaign for Potential Deep Impact Flyby Target 163249 (2002 GT)

[tedstryk]

more infos on Deep Impact/EPOXI observations of comet Garradd
http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/iau/cbet/0.../CBET003090.txt

This seems to be password protected.

[Paolo]

funny... it wasn't one month ago... anyway:

COMET C/2009 P1 (GARRADD)
Dennis Bodewits, Tony Farnham, and Michael F. A'Hearn, University of
Maryland, College Park, on behalf of the DIXI/EPOXI science team, report
results from observations of comet C/2009 P1 using the Medium Resolution
Instrument (MRI) on board the Deep Impact spacecraft. Broadband CLEAR and
narrowband CN filter images show a single-peaked variability (1- and 4-percent
amplitudes, respectively) with a period of 10.4 +/- 0.05 hr, assumed to be the
rotation period of the nucleus. Gas- and dust-production rates gradually
decreased from 2012 Feb. 23 to Apr. 6 UT, as the comet receded from the sun
(r = 1.7 to 2.1 AU). Additionally, the authors obtained photometry using
CLEAR, OH, and CN filters. Average production rates, derived from a 50"
aperture for Feb. 23, Mar. 6, and Apr. 6 were 2.3, 1.9, and 1.4 x 10^28
molecules/s for OH; 3.2, 2.7, and 1.5 x 10^26 molecules/s for CN -- both with
relative and systematic uncertainties of 10 and 25 percent, respectively,
with Af(rho) values (cf. IAUC 7342) of 3657, 3270, and 2946 cm (+/- 5 percent).

[Paolo]

another abstract from the 2012 DPS meeting:
A Study of C/2009 P1 Garradd's Dominant Volatiles as Observed by the Deep Impact HRI-IR Spectrometer

[morganism]

if we could impact Deep Impact on Garrard 2002.....

Would be fab to land it as a transmitter, and radar target, just to see grav pertubations , and outgassing changes over time, wouldn't need any prop for that.

[Paolo]

as tweeted by the Planetary Society (@exploreplanets) James Green speaking yesterday at the meeting of the Committee on Astrobiology and Planetary Science said that Deep Impact will be put in hibernation. it is not clear to me whether the asteroid flyby in 2020 is kept or not.

[Phil Stooke]

There would not be much point going into hibernation if the asteroid flyby was abandoned. I think it will just be a matter of budgets at the time, but there's no need to decide anything now. Just keep the option open.

Phil

[Paolo]

Deep Impact had a course correction yesterday http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-313
this should target the 2018 Earth flyby that will redirect the probe to 2002 GT