space telescope, the [[“Embedded Url”,”External link”,”http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/ask/37-Why-is-Venus-sometimes-called-Earth-s-twin-“,{“metric25”:1}] Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter , and the
, and the Martian moon [[“Embedded Url”,”External link”,”https://www.dlr.de/pf/Portaldata/6/Resources/lcpm/abstracts/Abstract2_Freeman_A.pdf”,{“metric25”:1}] Phobos .
, as photographed by Voyager 2 in . Image: NASA / JPL / USGS
The Trident mission would see a spacecraft zoom past Triton, a poorly understood moon around Neptune. This proposed mission from the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston, with help from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, would explore the potential for habitability at the extreme edges of the solar system.
Observations from NASA’s Voyager 2 probe revealed an icy yet highly active surface on Triton. And in fact, this moon features the youngest surface of any terrestrial body in the solar system, second only to Io. Triton might actually have its own atmosphere, which would make it only the second moon in our solar system known to host an atmosphere, the other being Saturn’s Titan. The moon might also be erupting material into space via cryovolcanoes (yes, literally ice volcanoes), and its ionosphere is thought to churn out complex organics that precipitate like snow. Excitingly, Triton could also feature a subsurface ocean.
mission, which stands for Venus Emissivity, Radio Science, InSAR, Topography, and Spectroscopy. This low-cost, two-year mission would see a satellite stationed in orbit around Venus, where it would perform a detailed analysis of the planet’s surface. The primary purpose of this mission, led by NASA’s JPL, is to understand the differences and similarities compared to Earth. Essentially, why did Venus deteriorate into our
the mission such that the satellite could deploy a nanosat probe into the atmosphere, where, with its mass spectrometer, it would hunt for noble gases.
It seems unlikely, therefore, that NASA would choose both the VERITAS and DAVINCI missions, but we’ll have to wait and see. Sadly, only one or two of these missions will get greenlit as an official NASA mission, a decision we can expect in [[“Embedded Url”,”External link”,”https://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag/march09/presentations/10Ivo.pdf”,{“metric25”:1}] [[“Embedded Url”,”External link”,”http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/ask/37-Why-is-Venus-sometimes-called-Earth-s-twin-“,{“metric25”:1}] [[“Embedded Url”,”External link”,”http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/ask/37-Why-is-Venus-sometimes-called-Earth-s-twin-“,{“metric25”:1}] Read More