Launch Date – May 2013
Launch Site – Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va.
Phase C – Design & Development
Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) is a NASA mission that will orbit the Moon and its main objective is to characterize the atmosphere and lunar dust environment.
LADEE implements an early priority of the National Resarch Council’s report, The Scientific Context for the Exploration of the Moon (NRC, 2007), namely to “determine the global density, composition, and time variability of the fragile lunar atmosphere before it is perturbed by further human activity.”
LADEE will have a mass about 130 kg. It will launched on a Minotaur V launch vehicle.
In addition to the science objectives, the mission will be testing a new spacecraft architecture called the ‘Modular Common Bus’ — which is being developed by NASA as a flexible, low cost, rapid turn around spacecraft for both orbiting and landing on the Moon and other deep space targets. It is hoped that such a capability will enable the Agency to perform future science goals for reduced cost.
Launch Date – November 2013
Phase B –Definition
The Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution Mission (MAVEN), set to launch in 2013, will explore the planet’s upper atmosphere, ionosphere and interactions with the sun and solar wind. Scientists will use MAVEN data to determine the role that loss of volatile compounds—such as carbon dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, and water—from the Mars atmosphere to space has played through time, giving insight into the history of Mars atmosphere and climate, liquid water, and planetary habitability. The MAVEN Principal Investigator is Dr. Bruce Jakosky of the University of Colorado’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (CU/LASP), and the project is managed by NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.
Launch Date – 2016
Launch Site – Kennedy Space Flight Center
Phase B Bridge – Definition
OSIRIS-REx stands for Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer. Scheduled for launch in 2016, the OSIRIS-REx mission will return the first samples ever taken from a special type of asteroid holding clues to the origin of the solar system and likely organic molecules that may have seeded life on Earth. OSIRIS-REx will also investigate an object potentially hazardous to humanity. 1999 RQ36 has a one-in-1,800 chance of impacting the Earth in the year 2182.
Spending over a year exploring 1999 RQ36 before acquiring samples, OSIRIS-REx will provide geologic context essential to expanding our understanding of the asteroid-comet continuum. The mission will provide near live coverage of 1999 RQ36 operations and sample return to Earth. Samples will return to Earth in the year 2023.
> Download OSIRIS-REx Fact Sheet | PDF | 2 Pages | 2.5MB
> Read NASA Selects OSIRIS-REx Mission
Launch Date – October 2011
Phase D –Design & Development
SAM is a suite of instruments (a mass spectrometer, gas chromatograph, and tunable laser spectrometer) onboard the Mars Science Laboratory rover.
The SAM team consists of scientists and engineers at GSFC, U. Paris/CNRS, JPL, and Honeybee Robotics, along with many additional external partners. SAM's five science goals address three of the most fundamental questions about the ability of Mars to support life - past, present, and future.
