JAXA is about to perform a Phobos sample return mission

(science.org)

74 points | by Muhammad523 2 days ago

6 comments

Animats 4 hours ago

Nice. These missions that tell us the basics about objects in the Solar System are more useful than, say, re-visiting the moon or Mars.
Venus and Europa could use some attention. Anything underway?

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- lucaslazarus 2 hours ago
  
  All these worlds are yours except Europa. Attempt no landing there.
- rexskimmer 1 hour ago
  
  There is also NASA's upcoming mission to Titan, where they plan to fly an octocopter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonfly_(Titan_space_probe)
  
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  - Muhammad523 1 hour ago
    
    I'm really exited about Dragonfly, as Titan is a world not too different from ours: it gas lakes and rivers (made out of hydrocarbons, like methane), dunes and mountains
- godshatter 3 hours ago
  
  Apparently five Venus missions (DAVINCI, VERITAS, Envision, Venus Life Finder, and Venus Orbiter) all in the next five years or so: https://www.space.com/astronomy/venus/these-5-venus-missions...
  For Europa, Europa Clipper Mission (already on the way): https://science.nasa.gov/mission/europa-clipper/mission-time...
  ... and JUICE (already on the way): https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Juice
  There might be others, those are just what I found in a quick search.
- tagami 3 hours ago
  
  Europa clipper launched 2 years ago arrives in 2030. DAVINCI, a Venusian probe, is slated net 2033
- hparadiz 2 hours ago
  
  Sample return from Venus is practically impossible with our current tech.
a3w 1 hour ago

Bringing Protomolecule to earth, when?
(Minor spoilers for The Expanse, word Protomolecule means something there.)
TGower 4 hours ago

JAXA does great work, they also publish the highest resolution open access global surface elevation model. Really impressive for a country with about 1/10th the GDP of the US.
dvh 5 hours ago

I hope they make some photos of Phobos monolith: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phobos_monolith
johnea 47 minutes ago

This is good space science.
Unlike iPhone selfies around the moon, or golf on mars.
Manned space missions are very rarely justified in the modern era.
An unmanned probe doing science for 20 years, or a one shot influenza photo op.
The cost is about the same...
hbarka 4 hours ago

I wonder how this mission compares in scale to the JAXA Hayabusa comet interceptor done twenty years ago.