Translated material
New space horizon
In early January, experts in astronautics celebrated the sixty year of launch of the first interplanetary apparatus Luna-1. According to the amazing coincidence in the same days, the research unmanned cosmonautics presented two achievements, which, without a doubt, are of historical significance. Moreover, they were perceived for granted, because the past year was distinguished by the activation of space activity, and in the new one she promises to become even more violent.
The first news came from the USA. January 1, at 5:33 on the UTC, the interplanetary apparatus "New Horizons" flew 3,500 km from the Kuiper belt (Kyubivano), which appears in the catalogs under the designation (486958) 2014 MU69, but more known as the Ultima Thule, vle, v. e. End of the world). The television pictures of the object began to come from the side of the apparatus at the end of December, but they were too blurry to draw some conclusions about its structure. Of course, the team of scientists working with the device immediately drew attention to the unusual form of the Kyubivano, reminiscent of the beans of the peanut, but for small bodies of the solar system “elongation” is not something abnormal 1 . Clear pictures came the next day, but from January 4 to 10, the data transfer was stopped due to the fact that the new horizons device went beyond the sun. The information received is enough to confirm the previously expressed hypothesis: the studied Kyubivano has the shape of a snowman, since it consists of two objects comparable in size: the larger of them (with a diameter of 31 km) was called ultima, smaller (14 km) - Tula. Probably, they formed near each other, and then they were gradually attracted by general gravity and “sticking together”. Scientists believe that during the flight of the "new horizons" next to Kyubivano, the device was supposed to collect seven gigabytes of data. Unfortunately, it is not so simple to get them: the transfer speed does not exceed 1200 bits per second, so the procedure will end only in September 2020 2 .
Nevertheless, specialists of the South-Western Research Institute (SWRI) and the Laboratory of Applied Physics (APL) University of Jones Hopkins, who initiated the project, have the right to deserved honors. Their success can be compared with the great achievements of the past, and it will undoubtedly affect the implementation of future missions. First of all, it is necessary to recall that the “New Horizons” apparatus was created not to study Ultim Tule, but to solve a specific, albeit very ambitious problem - to obtain reliable data about Pluto and the system of its satellites. It is known that the development of an apparatus capable of flying to the farthest planet of the solar system (in those days Pluto was still considered a full planet) began in the jet laboratory (JPL) in 1996. Subsequently, the project was repeatedly reviewed, until he was stopped in September 2000 as “inadequate” in value. Under the pressure of the scientific community, a contest for a cheaper option was announced, and NASA reported on November 29, 2001 about its choice: it was the project “New Horizons: Supply of Light on the Border Worlds” (New Horizons: Shendding Light on Frontier Worlds). The entire budget, including the manufacture of the apparatus, its launch, control of the flight and processing of the accepted data, amounted to 700 million dollars, which looks relatively small: for example, the cost of the mission of the LRO apparatus (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter), which currently studies in detail the surface of the heavenly body, was 583 million dollars. 2006. With a starting weight of 478 kg, he carried seven scientific devices: a camera of long -range shooting Lorri; ALICE ultraviolet spectrometer; spectrometer of the visible and infrared range Ralph; spectrometer of energetic particles Pepssi; SWAP solar wind analyzer; SDC dust counter; REX 3 radio expression apparatus. At the end of February 2007, the device made a gravitational maneuver at Jupiter, increasing its speed and transferring excellent pictures of the planet-giant and some of its satellites to Earth. “New Horizons” reached the main goal of his journey on July 14, 2015, passing at a distance of 12,472 km from the surface of Pluto; It took fifteen months to transfer the collected data. As a result, both Pluto himself and his largest companion Kharon were cartographs in detail; Pictures of Satellites of Nikta, Kerber and Hydra were obtained; The chemical composition of the atmosphere and the distant world, etc., by that time had already decided on the next purpose for the apparatus: on August 28 it was announced that of the three candidates discovered by the Hubble orbital telescope (Hubble), it would become Kyubivano (486958) 2014 MU69, which was opened a year before. In the fall, the device held a series of four corrections, reaching a new flight path 4 .
Thus, for the first time in the history of unmanned cosmonautics, one of the goals of the mission was determined during the discoveries made after the launch of the interplanetary apparatus, which in itself is an exceptional event. Moreover, Ultima Tule for decades will remain the only object of the Kuiper belt, which was able to see from close range. The importance of its study is due to the fact that Kyubivano was formed during the early youth of the solar system (i.e. 4.6 billion years ago) and has not changed much since then. Studying Ultima Tule, scientists launch a kind of “time machine”, looking in the era, which we so far have a very vague idea. Of course, it would be much more useful for science to land on one of the remote objects of the mobile robot, but before planning such a mission, it is necessary to figure out what surprises are waiting for him there.
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The second New Year's achievement belongs to the Chinese. January 3 at 02:26 UTC on the back of the moon, the Automatic station “Chane-4”, sent to space on December 7, 2018, safely sat on the back of the moon. Among other things, she delivered a Rover “Yuit-2” there, which leaned down on the guide to the surface twelve hours after the adjustment. The mission is part of the Chinese program of remote study of our natural satellite. At the first stage, the identical devices of Chan-1 (launch on October 24, 2007) and Chan-2 (launch on October 1, 2010), the main purpose of which was to draw up a three-dimensional map of the moon, went into space. At the same time, after performing the main tasks of Chan-2, he was first transferred to the L-2 Li-2-System-Sun Libration point, and then left it to photograph the converging asteroid Tutatis (4179 Toutatis); Their meeting took place on December 13, 2012 5 . The Chane-3 station, launched on December 1, 2013, was a fundamentally new apparatus-it was intended for landing on the lunar surface, in the northern part of the sea of rains, which was successfully done on December 14 (it is worth remembering that the Luna-24 Soviet apparatus in August 1976 settled before the Luna). A six-wheeled Rover “Yuit-1”, which transmitted data until March 2015, came off the landing platform. The Chan-4 station is the “understudy” of the previous one, but for it they came up with a more ambitious target-the first landing in history on the reverse (“invisible”) side of the moon, on the plain in the shock crater pocket (Von Karman). The main difficulty was how to transmit data from there, because the Earth is always behind the moon. To relay on May 20, 2018, the Chinese National Cosmic Administration (CNSA) launched the Zueziao apparatus, which was brought to the L-2 Li-2-Luna-Luna Libration point, where Chan-4 was waiting for the landing to the surface.
It turns out that the People’s Republic of People's Republic with one successful mission fixed the whole pile of historical priorities: the first data satellite data on the back of the moon; The first station that made a soft landing on the back of the moon; The first lunar rover on the back of the moon. The first long-lived colony of organisms on the moon can be added to the list: among standard research devices (television chambers, spectrometers, dosimeter, subfodier radar), scientists placed a small bio-stagnanter-a hermetic aluminum cylinder weighing 3 kg, inside of which there are soil, air, water, potatoes and seeds of potatoes and potatoes and potatoes and potatoes and potatoes and potatoes and potatoes and potato seed Arabidopsis ( Arabidopsis Thaliana , Tal Raucheida), as well as silkworm eggs. It is assumed that the seeds will germinate, larvae will hatch from the eggs, after which environmental balance will be established inside the container. The development of a closed biosphere will be monitored by a miniature camera 6 . Of course, comparing the latest successes of China in the study of the moon with similar achievements of the USSR and the United States half -century ago, we can say that nothing fundamentally new has been done, but there will be crawling, because the Chane series spacecraft has demonstrated the level of technology that is not available today by one of the leaders of the Moon Race. In essence, the Chinese can only deliver the lunar soil and land on the surface of their astronaut, to which they are approaching step by step.
New Year's achievements successfully complemented a number of triumphal events last year: landing mobile robots from the side of the Japanese Khayabus-2 station to the surface of the asteroid Ryugu; Successful launches of the Solar Probe solar probe and the Bepicolombo Mercury apparatus; The prosperous landing of the American automatic laboratory of Insight (Interior Exploration USISMIC Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) in the western part of the Elisius plain on Mars. One gets the impression that unmanned astronautics is experiencing a real Renaissance.
Unfortunately, in modern Russia, plans for further study of the solar system for many years remain only plans. You can try to comfort the fact that our country is still a leader in manned cosmonautics. However, one should not forget that it is the data collected by research devices that form our idea of the goals and objectives of the further development of astronautics, including the manned one. Without understanding where and why to fly, it is impossible to form a single vision of ways of penetration into extraterrestrial space, understanding of priorities and difficulties. The absence of a clear strategy, in turn, leads to the degradation of the existing technical register. The past year of domestic cosmonautics was remembered not by achievements, but by a series of scandalous news and emergency launch of the Soyuz MS-10 ship in October 2018.
Of course, the Russian missile and space industry has a potential for growth and improvement, but it is time to admit: the field of opportunities is reduced, leadership is lost, and the whole policy of our country in the field of space activity needs a revision.
Anton Pervushin
1 spacacenews.com/new-horizons-completes-ofy-off-utima-thule/
2 nytimes.com/2019/01/03/science/ultima-thule-pictures-new-horizons.html
3 Sharov V. The first mission to Pluto in history // Cosmonautics News. 2006. No. 3
4 Ilyin A. New Horizons - At Pluto! // Cosmonautics News. 2015. No. 9
5 Lisov I. “Chan-2” explores asteroid // Cosmonautics News. 2013. No. 2