Mission to Venus

[Tuckerfan]

Complete with rover!

Writing in the latest edition of the journal Acta Astronautica (vol 56, p 750), a team led by Geoffrey Landis of NASA's Glenn Research Center in Ohio says that an autonomous solar-powered aircraft could cruise between different altitudes and locations in Venus's wild atmosphere, making measurements and radar-imaging the surface at 10 times the resolution possible with an orbiting craft. They say this would provide far better data than the Soviet and US probes of the 1970s and 1980s, which were only able to make atmospheric measurements for a short time as they descended to their doom in the planet's violent, corrosive winds. But the planet's dense atmosphere is ideal for a flying craft. A wing's lift depends directly on the density of the atmosphere and the atmospheric pressure on Venus is about 90 times that of Earth. After being released by an orbiter, the craft's origami-like wings would unfurl from an "aeroshell" . Solar panels on the craft's surface could absorb large amounts of the intense solar energy, powering motors to allow the craft to fly continuously. And the planet's slow rotation, with one day and night on Venus taking 117 Earth days, means a solar flyer could stay on the daylight side indefinitely.

But down on the ground, where temperatures on the planet's day-side reach around 450 °C, a rover undertaking geological and imaging work would not last long. "We think we can get electrical things like motors and transistors to work at those temperatures, but not the microelectronics for computers," says Landis, who is also part of the science team running the Spirit and Opportunity missions. His answer is to land a relatively dumb rover on the surface - which would be heat-proof, acid-proof and pressure-proof. The microchips that control the rover's motion, communication and imaging would be housed on the solar-powered flyer 50 kilometres above. "With no vulnerable on-board computer, we might then be able to duplicate the Spirit and Opportunity missions," Landis says. The down side would be the delay while the flying computer relays data to or from the dumb rover via a radio link.

Neat idea, now if they can only get the funding to do it with.

[Crazieman]

wow...

[AK]

Yeah. That still sounds like a pretty extreme engineering challenge, with or without a sophisticated computer.

[Doodler]

Complete with rover!

Writing in the latest edition of the journal Acta Astronautica (vol 56, p 750), a team led by Geoffrey Landis of NASA's Glenn Research Center in Ohio says that an autonomous solar-powered aircraft could cruise between different altitudes and locations in Venus's wild atmosphere, making measurements and radar-imaging the surface at 10 times the resolution possible with an orbiting craft. They say this would provide far better data than the Soviet and US probes of the 1970s and 1980s, which were only able to make atmospheric measurements for a short time as they descended to their doom in the planet's violent, corrosive winds. But the planet's dense atmosphere is ideal for a flying craft. A wing's lift depends directly on the density of the atmosphere and the atmospheric pressure on Venus is about 90 times that of Earth. After being released by an orbiter, the craft's origami-like wings would unfurl from an "aeroshell" . Solar panels on the craft's surface could absorb large amounts of the intense solar energy, powering motors to allow the craft to fly continuously. And the planet's slow rotation, with one day and night on Venus taking 117 Earth days, means a solar flyer could stay on the daylight side indefinitely.

But down on the ground, where temperatures on the planet's day-side reach around 450 °C, a rover undertaking geological and imaging work would not last long. "We think we can get electrical things like motors and transistors to work at those temperatures, but not the microelectronics for computers," says Landis, who is also part of the science team running the Spirit and Opportunity missions. His answer is to land a relatively dumb rover on the surface - which would be heat-proof, acid-proof and pressure-proof. The microchips that control the rover's motion, communication and imaging would be housed on the solar-powered flyer 50 kilometres above. "With no vulnerable on-board computer, we might then be able to duplicate the Spirit and Opportunity missions," Landis says. The down side would be the delay while the flying computer relays data to or from the dumb rover via a radio link.

Neat idea, now if they can only get the funding to do it with.

Why bother with an intellegent glider? Stick it on a towed dirigible with a hardwired connection tethered to the rover, with wireless as a dual channel/backup.

Or heck, 50km is so high you may as well not waste time dropping the chips and control systems to the planet at all and just keep them on board the orbiter. At this point, you pull the same routine that they did on Mars and send a pair of missions, so you can maximize your useful time on the ground by doing a hand off between the orbiters as they pass overhead.

Select your landing sites to maximize the footprint time under each orbiter for the most return.

[um3k]

I have a video.

[Evan]

I want to know more about just how they plan to make electronics work in those conditions. It's going to need a transceiver as well a some power source. I can see motors working and vacuum tubes can be used.

Solar power isn't an option on the surface and RTGs aren't designed to operate at that ambient temp.

The only battery I know of that will work at that temperature is a lithium-iron-sulfide battery. It can work to 500C.

There are discrete transistors made of silicon carbide that can run up to 550C so that is possible.

Video would be nice, maybe a flying spot scanner?

[Sock Munkey]

The signal delay over a mere 50 km is negligeble so putting the computers in the flier won't slow down the rover.