Refine
Year of publication
Institute
- Fachbereich Luft- und Raumfahrttechnik (141) (remove)
Document Type
- Article (72)
- Conference Proceeding (58)
- Part of a Book (9)
- Other (1)
- Report (1)
Keywords
- solar sail (5)
- Eisschicht (3)
- GOSSAMER-1 (3)
- MASCOT (3)
- Sonde (3)
- Mars (2)
- Solar sail (2)
- Spacecraft (2)
- Trajectory Optimization (2)
- multiple NEA rendezvous (2)
Innovative interplanetary deep space missions, like a main belt asteroid sample
return mission, require ever larger velocity increments (∆V s) and thus ever
more demanding propulsion capabilities. Providing much larger exhaust velocities than chemical high-thrust systems, electric low-thrust space-propulsion
systems can significantly enhance or even enable such high-energy missions. In
1995, a European-Russian Joint Study Group (JSG) presented a study report
on “Advanced Interplanetary Missions Using Nuclear-Electric Propulsion”
(NEP). One of the investigated reference missions was a sample return (SR)
from the main belt asteroid (19) Fortuna. The envisaged nuclear power plant,
Topaz-25, however, could not be realized and also the worldwide developments
in space reactor hardware stalled. In this paper, we investigate, whether such
a mission is also feasible using a solar electric propulsion (SEP) system and
compare our SEP results to corresponding NEP results.