Five space exploration missions to look out for in 2023.
Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer
Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice) will be Europe’s first dedicated robotic mission to Jupiter.
The European Space Agency (ESA) plans to launch the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer mission in April 2023.
It will also become the first spacecraft to shift its own orbit to another world by moving to Ganymede’s orbit
Works
The Juice mission will complete 35 fly-bys near Jupiter and will make detailed observations about the gas giant and its three large ocean-bearing moons–Europa, Ganymede and Callisto.
The mission will also characterise its moons as both planetary objects and potential habitat.
It will monitor Jupiter’s complex environment in depth including its magnetism, radiation and plasma.
It will study the Galilean moons’ hidden oceans, magnetism, heating processes, tidal effects, orbits, surface activity, cores, compositions, atmospheres and space environments.
It will hunt for biologically essential and important elements like carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, magnesium and iron.
Ganymede
Among the three moons, Ganymede will be the primary scientific target of the Juice mission.
It is the largest moon in the Solar System and is larger than both Pluto and Mercury.
It is also the only moon to have its own intrinsic magnetic field. Mercury and Earth are the only other solid bodies that generate a dipole field like Ganymede.
OSIRIS-REx returning Earth
The Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security — Regolith Explorer, mercifully more commonly known as OSIRIS-REx, is a NASA mission to near-Earth asteroid Bennu.
A key goal of this robotic mission was to acquire samples of Bennu and return them to Earth for analysis.
It is now fast returning to Earth with up to a kilogram of precious asteroid samples stored aboard.
History
It was launched in September 2016. In 2021, it took off from the asteroid Bennu.
The spacecraft is carrying samples of the asteroid and is on track to return them to Earth in September 2023
Asteroid Bennu
Bennu is an approximately diamond-shaped world just half a kilometre in size, but has many interesting characteristics.
It can act as time capsules for the earliest history of our solar system.
It likely formed in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and has drifted closer to the Earth.
They preserve chemical signatures from when the universe was a younger place and might even contain samples of the ancient building blocks of life
Some of the minerals detected within it have been altered by water, implying that Bennu’s ancient parent body possessed liquid water.
It also has an abundance of precious metals, including gold and platinum.
It is however classed as a potentially hazardous object with a (very) small possibility of Earth impact in the next century
Visiting Asteroid Psyche
Following OSIRIS-REx’s return, NASA plans to launch the Psyche mission to study the metallic asteroid 16 Psyche. The Psyche mission will offer a window into the collisions and accretion that create terrestrial planets.
Instruments aboard the Psyche spacecraft will include a Multispectral Imager, a Gamma Ray and Neutron Spectrometer, a Magnetometer and an X-band Gravity Science Investigation.
The mission will also test a new laser communication technology that uses light at near-infrared wavelengths instead of radio waves to communicate with the Earth.
Asteroid Psyche
The asteroid orbits the Sun in an orbit between Mars and Jupiter and is unique because it appears to be the exposed nickel-iron core of an early planet, one of the building blocks of the solar system.
Chandrayaan-3
ISRO’s Chandrayaan-3 mission will be a follow up to the Chandrayaan-2 mission, which failed to achieve a soft landing on the Moon.
It will carry a lunar lander and a lunar rover to Earth’s lone natural satellite.
The mission is scheduled to launch aboard a Launch Vehicle 3 (LVM3) rocket, in june this year.
Instruments
The mission’s propulsion module will carry the lander and rover configuration to an orbit that is about 100 kilometres above the Moon’s surface.
It will also carry a Spectro-polarimetry of HAbitable Planet Earth (SHAPE) payload to study the spectral and polarimetric measurements of Earth from the lunar orbit.
The mission’s lunar lander will carry instruments like o Chandra’s Surface Thermophysical Experiment (ChaSTE) to measure the thermal conductivity and temperature;
Instrument for Lunar Seismic Activity (ILSA) for measuring the seismicity around the landing site;
Langmuir Probe (LP) to estimate the plasma density and its variations.
A passive Laser Retroreflector Array from NASA will also hitch a ride aboard the lander.
dearMoon Project
The long-awaited dearMoon project, which will take members of the public on a six-day trip around the Moon and back, is due for launch on Starship and was originally planned for 2023.
It will be the first true deep space tourism launch.
This mission will mark a big change in the way we think about space, as previously only astronauts picked using incredibly stringent criteria have been able to go into deep space.
The success or failure of the dearMoon mission could affect whether deep space tourism becomes the next big thing, or it is relegated back to being a pipe-dream.
Also- Newly-developed rockets- Various private space companies will be conducting the maiden flights of their new rockets
India’s private space launch
Skyroot Aerospace, which successfully launched its Vikram-S rocket in November 2022, is soon to become the first private Indian company to launch a satellite.
Skyroot’s first satellite launch is planned for 2023, with a goal of undercutting the cost of private space launch rivals by producing its 3D-printed rockets in a matter of days.
If successful, this could also provide a route for cheaper launches of scientific missions, enabling a faster rate of research.
SpaceX Starship
Starship will be the largest spacecraft capable of carrying humans from Earth to destinations in space (the International Space Station is larger, but it was assembled in space).
It will be the most powerful launch vehicle ever to fly, capable of lifting 100 tonnes of cargo to low Earth orbit.
Starship is the collective name for a two-component system consisting of the Starship spacecraft (which carries the crew and cargo) and the Super Heavy rocket.
The rocket component will lift Starship to some 65km altitude before separating and returning to Earth in a controlled landing.
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