Martian plan of Russia and Europe

The Exomars project (Exomars) is one of the two main planetary projects of Russia, which will have to be implemented in the next five years. Exomars promises to become a special project both for its initiator, the European Space Agency (ESA), and for Russia, which entered it with a full partner recently - the official agreement between ESA and Roscosmos was signed a little less than a year ago. In early February 2014, a working meeting on the project was held at the Institute of Space Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which discussed readiness for the implementation of scientific experiments on both sides of the work in the near future. Olga Square tells about the discussion.

The workshop in Iki was, in fact, the first joint discussion of the scientific program of the project after the official agreement. By nature, it was truly a worker: a minimum of plenary reports, several separate meetings (Splinter Meetings) devoted to scientific experiments on the devices, and many technical details of the work of specific devices and the general organization of joint work.

Exomars was conceived in ESA as a project to study the suitability of Mars for life. Over his long history (the official “chronicle” on the agency’s website opens in 1999), he underwent quite a few changes and perturbations, primarily related to financial issues. In 1999, the project became a NASA project, but in 2011 it came out of it due to a lack of funding, which threatened the entire project. Around the same time, Russian space science experienced the death of Fobos-Gront, the only “Martian” apparatus in its program. The question of whether Russia can join the “exomars” was asked quite quickly, but for some time it was required to coordinate the level of participation and review of the schedule for the project.

Today, the exomars project is two missions and four spacecraft. The first mission (two ka) according to the plan starts in early 2016 and should arrive at Mars to its end. Here, the devices are separated: the orbital TGO (reduction from Trace Gas Orbiter, the “Orbital apparatus for the study of small components of the atmosphere” remains in the orbit, and the EDM landing module (although not so long ago he received the official name “Schiaparelli”, the meeting participants preferred to use the previous abbreviation from Entry, DESCENT AND Landing Demonstrator Module, “The module for demonstrating entering the atmosphere, descent and landing”) will land on Mars.

Scientific equipment will be on board both, but in the case of EDM, science only complements the main task-the development of all stages of landing before sending to the planet of the Mar-Cail. For ESA, this topic is especially important, since the preceding landing apparatus of the Beagle 2 agency, which fell to Mars in December 2004, after entering the atmosphere did not show signs of life.

Russian participation in the first stage of Exomars includes the actual provision of start using the Proton launch vehicle and the Breeze-M Handbox and, more interesting for scientists, are two scientific experiments on board TGO.

The task of this apparatus is to measure the concentrations of small components of the Martian atmosphere (such as methane, water vapors, nitrogen oxides, hydrogen peroxide, sulfate, sulfur gas, etc.) and try to “tie” them to certain areas of Mars. Russian devices are a complex of ACS spectrometers (ACS - Atmospheric Chemistry Suite) and a neutron detector Frend (Frend - Fine Resolution Epithermal Neutron Detector). Both are developed at the Institute of Space Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences on the basis of those who have already operated in space (including on ESA Mars Express and Venus Express) and well -established tools. The ACS continues devices for infrared spectroscopy, one of the main methods of studying planetary atmospheres. Frend is a nuclear planetology device, the heir to Hend detectors (the Mars Odyssey, NASA orbital apparatus) and Dan (Curiosity, NASA), which measure the distribution of the second-power compounds, including water, in the upper layer of soil.

Two more devices: a set of NOMAD spectrometers (Nadir and Occultation for Mars Discovery) and the high resolution camera Cassis (Color and Steereo Surface Imaging System) - are made in Europe with the participation of the United States. The total mass of scientific equipment on board TGO is about 130 kg, it should work in orbit at least until the apparatus of the second part of the mission arrives.

In the TGO program, in addition to scientific observations, there is a second, no less important, part - the connection with the EDM on the surface of the planet and the transfer of its information to Earth. After the planned operation of the landing module is completed, approximately in a week, TGO will switch to orbit of observations with a height of about 400 km and from there will begin planned observations before the apparatus of the second part of the mission. Their start is scheduled for May 2018 again with the help of the Proton/Breeze-M ligament. A landing module (DM) will go to Mars, which should deliver to the planet Paster Mark Road on a landing platform.

After the Pasteur moves to the surface, the landing platform will turn into a scientific station, for which a set of devices will be assembled on it. DM is being developed in NGOs. S.A. Lavochkina; The scientific load on it is also included in the zone of responsibility of Russia, the corresponding developments are carried out under the leadership of IKI RAS. Two more Russian scientific devices (infrared spectrometer Isem and neutron spectrumer adron-RM) will work on a rover. Also for Pasteur, Russia will put radioisotope heat elements.

In addition to cooperation in the engineering and scientific component of the project, Russia and Europe plan to create a single system of receiving and processing data. It will be involved in far space communications in Europe, the USA (although NASA has ceased to be a partner in the entire project, American participation in Exomars is preserved) and Russia.

The long and ornate story of the preparation of Exomars is now part of the final stage, a little less than two years remained until the first start of the project. Shortly before the meeting in Moscow, ESA published the news that OHB System was transferred to Thales Alenia Space, the main contractor for the project, the TGO orbital apparatus platform.

The second “MARSODICAL” part of the project is still in the stage of outline design, the selection of a scientific load for the platform and the choice of landing site. In February, an approximate list of scientific devices was presented, which can be installed on a landing platform, but the final decision on them will be most likely in March, when the defense of the sketch project is held, first in Russia, and then in Europe. In parallel with this, applications are accepting at the Pasteur landing site, which will end at the end of February.

To summarize the workshop is a difficult matter, since it was not so much about general things as about specific technical details and agreements on working with scientific data. But at least one thing was interesting to everyone - this is funding.

Exomars has been in jeopardy more than once due to a lack of funds. Presenting the current status of the project, Rolf de Grot, the head of the coordination control of the space development programs using automatic ESA stations, was especially described in detail by the Risk reduction plan, which provides for the additional contributions of the ESAC countries of the Russian side, Leo Green, the director of the IKU RAS, began the meeting, quoting the new head of Roskosmos Oleg Ostapenko that Russia confirms all its obligations on the project.

Financials are one of the “headaches” of the project participants, but not the only one. Of course, it would be tempting to imagine the joint work on the “exomars” fully or almost devoid of difficulties, but we are talking about the combination of two different technical cultures, and conflicts are inevitable. The work conclusion adopted following the results of the meeting is almost entirely from the recommendations “Communicate more”: to report on changes in the design of the apparatus in a timely manner, to quickly respond to requests and technical papers and other similar documents.

During the meeting, many participants emphasized that one of the main difficulties of cooperation is associated with formal things - it is necessary to combine different protocols for preparing projects. The workflow requires that foreign partners participate in all procedures from both the Russian side, and this is not always provided. So far, the problems managed to solve the problems, and one of the achievements of the “exomars” may consist precisely in the fact that such joint approvals in the future will be simplified. And new projects may well follow - ESA has already expressed interest in joint study of the moon.

It is no secret that Exomars has become a kind of “lifesaver” for the Russian Martian program, which risked slowing down for a long time after the death of “phobos-group”. According to its results, scientists will not only receive another portion of information about the atmosphere of Mars. Since Russia's participation includes many elements, including the development of a landing platform and data receiving, in the end the entire industry related to space research can get a powerful incentive to development. It is no coincidence that NASA announced the next “Mars -Rage” mission after the success of Curiosity: good news spur interests, a positive feedback arises, which now is very lacking in the entire space sphere in Russia.