[X] My Assistant

[imran]

Aerobot aims for Titan

An intelligent floating robot could help to explore Saturn's moon Titan, following flight tests that prove it can survey large areas of land completely autonomously. The aerobot is even smart enough to avoid dangerous turbulence.

This summer, aerobot's team got further funding to develop a full mission proposal, which may lead to a launch in 2012.

Good news and I hope this happens but a more realistic timeframe is late next decade, more likely after an Europa mission.

[Guest_Richard Trigaux_*]

mmmmh ... alway the problem of cost.

Let us say:

-it is better an expensive mission which fulfills its goal, rather than a cheap one which is just present on the place.

-if there are money limitation, it is better to limit the number of mission rather than reducing the quality of each mission.

-The childish game of "competition" should left place to international cooperation. Many countries could provide subsystems, or even simply money or ground support. When we deal with billions, even only some millions can make a difference.

[JRehling]

-if there are money limitation, it is better to limit the number of mission rather than reducing the quality of each mission.

I think you mean rather than many reduced missions to different worlds. However, if there were an option for many (or two) aerobots to Titan within the same cap as one larger one, the option of many would be appealing. With Titan's winds being what they are, it may be impossible for an aerobot to travel very far north-south during its lifetime. Imagine Mars after only Viking 1 and Viking 2 -- even now we've seen five locations (with a few km roving in two of those). Huygens has shown us one location (and its surroundings) -- a single big aerobot would probably be sent either to the equatorial area, to overfly a variety of dark/light terrain (as Huygens did), or to the deep south, to investigate, eg, Mezzoramia. Two Titan aerobots would make even more sense than two MERs for Mars -- if only a 90-day mission can be guaranteed. Now, if a longer life were likely, a single craft might eventually travel long distances in latitude and perform a more complete overview of Titan. Unfortunately, a helium balloon is likely to have problems with longevity that a wheeled vehicle does not -- you can sit on wheels forever and not sustain much disrepair, while the helium supply can only decrease over time unless a zero-leak system can be guaranteed.

The Pioneer Venus solution was to send one probe that contained the superset of atmospheric instruments along with smaller ones that probed basic quantities in a variety of places. That could perhaps be an option at Titan, to have one aerobot along with several very minimal (no need to probe isotope ratios in multiple locations) sounding probes that drop in at a carefully-selected variety of locations. Of course, all of this talk pushes the cost higher and higher.

[Bob Shaw]

Unfortunately, a helium balloon is likely to have problems with longevity that a wheeled vehicle does not -- you can sit on wheels forever and not sustain much disrepair, while the helium supply can only decrease over time unless a zero-leak system can be guaranteed.

Which is why an RTG-heated hot-air balloon is so attractive!