Psyche, Discovery Mission 14 - a visit to the metallic asteroid, 16 Psyche |
Psyche, Discovery Mission 14 - a visit to the metallic asteroid, 16 Psyche |
Mar 15 2017, 05:19 AM
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#16
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2530 Joined: 20-April 05 Member No.: 321 |
Nothing of any importance, but I thought it would be nice to take a look at Psyche at least once before the mission… I guess there's time to look at it a lot of times before then. Truth be told, I just pointed my telescope at the right place, took 3 pictures, then found it in the imagery after the fact. I never saw it with my eye, at least not knowing that I was seeing it.
The fact that it (identified with the cross hairs) is about fourth in brightness in a rather small and random portion of the sky gives you some idea for how unassuming Psyche is. It's currently magnitude 10.6 and the brighter star near it is magnitude 8.2. But the interest here is obviously in its unique composition, not size. |
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Mar 15 2017, 05:46 AM
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#17
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Merciless Robot Group: Admin Posts: 8785 Joined: 8-December 05 From: Los Angeles Member No.: 602 |
Very nice! We'll call this the official "before" shot.
-------------------- A few will take this knowledge and use this power of a dream realized as a force for change, an impetus for further discovery to make less ancient dreams real.
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May 25 2017, 02:01 PM
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#18
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Member Group: Members Posts: 544 Joined: 17-November 05 From: Oklahoma Member No.: 557 |
The launch date for this mission has been moved up one year to the summer of 2022. The arrival at Psyche will move up to 2026, a whopping four years earlier than originally scheduled.
NASA/JPL News Release |
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May 25 2017, 08:16 PM
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#19
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2106 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
Trajectory calculators coming through again! This move also skips the Earth flyby, leaving only the Mars flyby in 2023.
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May 25 2017, 09:57 PM
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#20
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Member Group: Members Posts: 655 Joined: 22-January 06 Member No.: 655 |
Wow!
A very welcome development. It's very rare in business/technology that faster = cheaper and more efficient. I can't remember a 'planetary' mission being moved forward in this way before. |
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Oct 1 2017, 01:58 PM
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#21
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2106 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
Testing of the ion engines has started; this mission will be the first use of Hall-effect thrusters beyond the Moon. Combined with laser communication, quite an upgrade over Dawn! https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=6958
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Mar 21 2019, 03:29 PM
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#22
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2106 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
A possible piggyback flyby-mission to Pallas might be approved soon (!)
https://www.space.com/nasa-considering-athe...oid-pallas.html The flyby would happened one year after launch, after the Mars gravity assist of the main spacecraft. |
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Jul 30 2019, 08:05 PM
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#23
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 71 Joined: 12-December 16 Member No.: 8089 |
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Jul 30 2019, 09:00 PM
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#24
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2542 Joined: 13-September 05 Member No.: 497 |
I'm having a hard time trying to find any SmallSat announcement by NASA in the past few months... https://www.nasa.gov/feature/small-satellit...ars-and-beyond/ I'm not sure if the Psyche launch is available for these and it doesn't really say. -------------------- Disclaimer: This post is based on public information only. Any opinions are my own.
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Feb 29 2020, 04:23 AM
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#25
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2106 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
Launcher selected (Falcon Heavy!): https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-awa...-psyche-mission
There is also this: QUOTE two secondary payloads: Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (EscaPADE), which will study the Martian atmosphere, and Janus, which will study binary asteroids.
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Feb 29 2020, 04:34 PM
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#26
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Member Group: Members Posts: 544 Joined: 17-November 05 From: Oklahoma Member No.: 557 |
Hmmm... no mention of the proposed Athena probe to Pallas being launched with them.
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Feb 29 2020, 06:38 PM
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#27
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2542 Joined: 13-September 05 Member No.: 497 |
Hmmm... no mention of the proposed Athena probe to Pallas being launched with them. That mission wasn't selected, see the link above. More info about Janus at https://www.lpi.usra.edu/sbag/meetings/jun2...ns/Hartzell.pdf -------------------- Disclaimer: This post is based on public information only. Any opinions are my own.
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Mar 5 2020, 01:54 AM
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#28
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2106 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
A few more details here, including this bit about Psyche's composition:
QUOTE “What we did is we took all of the existing data about the asteroid Psyche — the whole science team worked on this for about 10 months — and tried to look at the data from every point of view,” Elkins-Tanton said. Scientists compared the data on Psyche with meteorites that have fallen to Earth, along with planetary formation models and other asteroids. “And what we’re finding is that it looks like, the current data seems to indicate, that Psyche is potentially less metallic than we thought it was originally,” Elkins-Tanton said. “It might just be 30 to 60 percent metal, instead of 90 percent metal. Maybe to any sensible person that would seem to be relatively unimportant, but in terms of how we think it might have been made, it makes it much more confusing. https://spaceflightnow.com/2020/03/04/nasa-...metal-asteroid/ |
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Mar 5 2020, 03:20 AM
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#29
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Merciless Robot Group: Admin Posts: 8785 Joined: 8-December 05 From: Los Angeles Member No.: 602 |
Hmm. Well, it's certainly possible that the parent object was shattered before it had finished full melt & differentiation.
Been expecting it to be mostly covered with rocky regolith anyhow, though, just from impact accretion over the eons. -------------------- A few will take this knowledge and use this power of a dream realized as a force for change, an impetus for further discovery to make less ancient dreams real.
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Mar 5 2020, 04:41 AM
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#30
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2106 Joined: 13-February 10 From: Ontario Member No.: 5221 |
The same reason I expect the dramatic spiked craters and "rusty" portions in the artist concepts of these press releases are quite exaggerated. Doubtless eons of micrometeorid bombardment will have worn any feature like that down (like the lunar landscape, which is far less sharp then the Chesley Bonestell paintings).
It will still look really cool, of course! |
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