Mission to Small Bodies In-Situ Investigations – Example on Mascot Lander

Abstract

In the last decades different space missions were planned and performed to asteroids and comets in the solar system. The scientific objectives of these missions were mainly focusing on physical and chemical properties of the small bodies. Nevertheless, one of the important goals was still to investigate the astrobiological context and the relevance of comets and asteroids for the origin of life. The MASCOT (‘Mobile Asteroid Surface Scout’) was a 10 kg mobile surface science package part of JAXA’s Hayabusa2 sample return mission. MASCOT has been developed by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in cooperation with the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES). The main objectives were to perform in-situ investigations of the asteroid surface and to support the sampling site selection for the mother spacecraft. The mission was launched in December 2014 from Tanegashima Space Center, Japan and reached the target asteroid Ryugu in summer 2018. The MASCOT lander was deployed to the surface on the 3rd of October 2018 after a mapping phase and an intense landing site selection process. MASCOT operated successfully for about 17 hours on the surface of Ryugu and performed its planned measurements by surviving two asteroid nights. The scientific results of MASCOT combined with those from the instruments aboard the Hayabusa2 mother spacecraft as well as the returned samples lead to a better understanding of asteroid Ryugu and the role of primitive asteroids during the history of the solar system. Following the example of Mascot on board HY2, the relevance of investigating small bodies with a highly integrated scientific payload for astrobiological aspects is discussed.