Saturday, March 3, 2012

Could Curiosity Rover Moonlight As Part of a Sample Return Mission?

Several considerations come to mind:

1. A "retrofit package" would have huge ratio of ancillary equipment to payload, which is highly inefficient in terms of spending the agency's small and shrinking budget.
2. The most interesting part of Mars is (possibly wet or icy) underground, beyond the range of ultraviolet radiation, GCR and solar wind. Since Curiosity ain't fitted with a drill, this is again inefficient.
3. There are no guarantees that the "retrofit package" lands accurately within reach of the MSL.

Source: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotScience/~3/SVvxR73fv9E/could-curiosity-rover-moonlight-as-part-of-a-sample-return-mission

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