Intelligent Drilling and Coring Technologies for Unmanned Interplanetary Exploration

The robotic technology, especially the intelligent robotics that can autonomously conduct numerous dangerous and uncertain tasks, has been widely applied to planetary explorations. Similar to terrestrial mining, before landing on planets or building planetary constructions, a drilling and coring activity should be first conducted to investigate the in-situ geological information. Given the technical advantages of unmanned robotics, utilizing an autonomous drill tool to acquire the planetary soil sample may be the most reliable and cost-effective solution. However, due to several unique challenges existed in unmanned drilling and coring activities, such as long-distance time delay, uncertain drilling formations, limited sensor resources, etc., it is indeed necessary to conduct researches to improve system’s adaptability to the complicated geological formations. Taking drill tool’s power consumption and soil’s coring morphology into account, this chapter proposed a drilling and coring characteristics online monitoring method to investigate suitable drilling parameters for different formations. Meanwhile, by applying pattern recognition techniques to classify different types of potential soil or rocks, a drillability classification model is built accurately to identify the current drilling formation. By combining suitable drilling parameters with the recognized drillability levels, a closed-loop drilling strategy is established finally, which can be applied to future interplanetary exploration

Study of sample drilling techniques for Mars sample return missions

To demonstrate the feasibility of acquiring various surface samples for a Mars sample return mission the following tasks were performed: (1) design of a Mars rover-mounted drill system capable of acquiring crystalline rock cores; prediction of performance, mass, and power requirements for various size systems, and the generation of engineering drawings; (2) performance of simulated permafrost coring tests using a residual Apollo lunar surface drill, (3) design of a rock breaker system which can be used to produce small samples of rock chips from rocks which are too large to return to Earth, but too small to be cored with the Rover-mounted drill; (4)design of sample containers for the selected regolith cores, rock cores, and small particulate or rock samples; and (5) design of sample handling and transfer techniques which will be required through all phase of sample acquisition, processing, and stowage on-board the Earth return vehicle. A preliminary design of a light-weight Rover-mounted sampling scoop was also developed

Geoscience and a Lunar Base: A Comprehensive Plan for Lunar Exploration

This document represents the proceedings of the Workshop on Geoscience from a Lunar Base. It describes a comprehensive plan for the geologic exploration of the Moon. The document begins by explaining the scientific importance of studying the Moon and outlines the many unsolved problems in lunar science. Subsequent chapters detail different, complementary approaches to geologic studies: global surveys, including orbiting spacecraft such as Lunar Observer and installation of a global geophysical network; reconnaissance sample return mission, by either automated rovers or landers, or by piloted forays; detailed field studies, which involve astronauts and teleoperated robotic field geologists. The document then develops a flexible scenario for exploration and sketches the technological developments needed to carry out the exploration scenario

Study of sampling systems for comets and Mars

Several aspects of the techniques that can be applied to acquisition and preservation of samples from Mars and a cometary nucleus were examined. Scientific approaches to sampling, grounded in proven engineering methods are the key to achieving the maximum science value from the sample return mission. If development of these approaches for collecting and preserving does not preceed mission definition, it is likely that only suboptimal techniques will be available because of the constraints of formal schedule timelines and the normal pressure to select only the most conservative and least sophisticated approaches when development has lagged the mission milestones. With a reasonable investment now, before the final mission definition, the sampling approach can become highly developed, ready for implementation, and mature enough to help set the requirements for the mission hardware and its performance

In-Situ Radar Observation of Shallow Lunar Regolith at the Chang’E-5 Landing Site : Research Progress and Perspectives

Funding Information: This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 42241139 and 42004099), the Opening Fund of the Key Laboratory of Lunar and Deep Space Exploration, Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. LDSE202005), the National Innovation and Entrepreneurship Training Program for College Students (No. 202310590016), the Fund of Shanghai Institute of Aerospace System Engineering (No. PZ_YY_SYF_JY200275), and the Shenzhen Municipal Government Investment Project (No. 2106_440300_04_03_901272).Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Workshop on Mars Sample Return Science

Martian magnetic history; quarantine issues; surface modifying processes; climate and atmosphere; sampling sites and strategies; and life sciences were among the topics discussed

Concept evaluation of Mars drilling and sampling instrument

The search for possible extinct or existing life is the goal of the exobiology investigations to be undertaken during future Mars missions. As it has been learnt from the NASA Viking, Pathfinder and Mars Exploration Rover mission, sampling of surface soil and rocks can gain only limited scientific information. In fact, possible organic signatures tend to be erased by surface processes (weathering, oxidation and exposure to UV radiation from the Sun). The challenge of the missions have mostly been getting there; only roughly one third of all Mars missions have reached their goal, either an orbit around the planet, or landing to the surface. The two Viking landers in the 1970's were the first to touch down the soil of Mars in working order and performing scientific studies there. After that there was a long gap, until 1997 the Pathfinder landed safely on the surface and released a little rover, the Sojourner. In 2004 other rovers came: the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit and a while after that, the sister rover Opportunity. These five successful landings are less than half of all attempts to land on Mars. Russia, Europe and the United States have all had their landers, but Mars is challenging. Even Mars orbit has been tough to reach by many nation's orbiters. It is then understandable that of these five successful landings, performed by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), there have not yet been very complicated mechanical deep-drilling instruments onboard. The risks to get there are great, and the risk of malfunctioning of a complicated instrument there is also high. Another reason to avoid a deep-driller from the lander payload is simply the mass constrains. A drill is a heavy piece of payload, and the mass allocations for scientific instruments are small. In the launch window of 2009, both European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA have their plans to send a rover to Mars. Both of them will include some means to analyse the subsurface material. ESA's rover, called the ExoMars rover, will carry a deep-driller onboard in its Pasteur payload. At the time of writing this thesis, an exact definition of the Pasteur drill has not yet been defined. The author of this thesis has studied the driller instruments in his past work projects and in his doctoral studies. The main focus of this thesis is to analyse the feasibility of different drill configurations to fit to the requirements of the ExoMars' Pasteur payload drill by using the information gathered from the past projects. In this thesis, the author introduces a new concept of a robotic driller, called the MASA drill. The MASA drill fulfils the needs for the drill instrument onboard the Pasteur payload. The main study in this thesis concentrates on design work of the MASA drill, as well as analysis of its operation and performance capabilities in the difficult task of drilling and sampling.reviewe

Coring Planetary Ices; Their Thermomechanical Behaviour

Spacecraft missions are underway that will mechanically probe the material found at the surface of cometary nuclei. Little is known about the physical properties of these bodies and how their surface material will respond to a probe's sampling mechanisms. Tools such as rotating drills or hammering bits can cause the otherwise pristine material to be damaged and heated. This work addresses the phenomenon of tool-induced heating and examines the properties of ices in three planetary environments in which such coring processes may occur. A unique drilling system has been built to provide data on the thermal response of ices under space-like conditions. Cold (-150 K) samples of water ice and carbon dioxide ice have been formed from the vapour phase and cored with an instrumented cutting head under low pressures. The effort used to core these ices has been measured as a function of temperature, coring speed, and depth rate. Three broad conclusions can be drawn from these experiments. 1) Carbon dioxide ice grown from its vapour at 150 K requires approximately one third of the mechanical effort needed to core or drill the same volume of water ice at a given rate at the same temperature. 2) The power needed to drive a coring tool through water ice at a fixed rotation speed and a given vertical rate trebles as the ice's temperature falls from 240 to 140 K. Specific cutting energies greater than 55 J m-3 have been recorded for ice at 140 K, and dense carbon dioxide at the same temperature has been shown to have one half of that strength displayed by water ice. 3) Mechanical effort is mostly converted into heat in a coring process. Temperature rises of at least 10 K have been measured in dense samples of cryogenic (-140 K) carbon dioxide ice around a coring tool that operated with power levels of no more than 2 W. For the same applied power, water ices are expected to display one third of this temperature rise seen when coring void-free carbon dioxide ice at the same temperature. The magnitude of this heating effect is assessed for a comet sampling tool on the Rosetta comet lander. It is expected that temperature rises of a few degrees will occur in water-ice rich material retrieved by the tool if the comet, at depths of several tens of centimetres, shows little porosity. It is also suggested that higher temperatures will be developed by extracting material from greater depths, where carbon dioxide may be present as a void-free ice

Catalog of lunar and Mars science payloads

This catalog collects and describes science payloads considered for future robotic and human exploration missions to the Moon and Mars. The science disciplines included are geosciences, meteorology, space physics, astronomy and astrophysics, life sciences, in-situ resource utilization, and robotic science. Science payload data is helpful for mission scientists and engineers developing reference architectures and detailed descriptions of mission organizations. One early step in advanced planning is formulating the science questions for each mission and identifying the instrumentation required to address these questions. The next critical element is to establish and quantify the supporting infrastructure required to deliver, emplace, operate, and maintain the science experiments with human crews or robots. This requires a comprehensive collection of up-to-date science payload information--hence the birth of this catalog. Divided into lunar and Mars sections, the catalog describes the physical characteristics of science instruments in terms of mass, volume, power and data requirements, mode of deployment and operation, maintenance needs, and technological readiness. It includes descriptions of science payloads for specific missions that have been studied in the last two years: the Scout Program, the Artemis Program, the First Lunar Outpost, and the Mars Exploration Program