NASA Scientist Develops Motorless Sailplanes To Explore Mars For Days At A Time
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A NASA engineer, in a partnership with the University of Arizona, has developed a motorcycle without motorcycles that can fly on Mars for days. Called ‘Sailplanes’, this new device will only use the wind for propulsion and will help in detailed studies of the mars atmosphere. According to Alexandre Kling, a researcher at the Mars Nasa climate modeling center, the aircraft weighs around 2kg and has a wing width of about 11 feet.
While Rovers and Orbiter are very helpful in collecting images and first hand data, there are important components of the red planet that attracts most planetary scientists. The idea behind the development of this aircraft is to check the planetary boundary layer only a few kilometers above the surface. “This is where all the exchanges between the surface and the atmosphere occur,” Kling said in a statement. “This is where the dust is taken and sent to the atmosphere, where the trace gas is mixed, where the large-scale wind modulation by the flow of mountains occurs. And we just do not have much data about it.”Another reason why this sailing aircraft has proven to be very helpful in Mars’s exploration is a much longer operational time. Helicopter ingenuity, which was sent to Mars with the perseverance of Rover last year, can fly for only three minutes while using solar power, and reaches a height of only 12 meters (39 feet). Sailplanes, on the other hand, will fly in the sky Mars for days, allowing them to reach further than ingenuity and visit new locations.
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Function from screen planningScreen planning that only uses wind for propulsion is equipped with flight sensors, temperatures and gas and cameras. In a paper published in the journal Aerospace, the team detailed several methods that planned to launch aircraft on Mars, remained and made him land. The engineers plan to send aircraft as secondary loads on a larger mission of Mars.
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For placement, the team proposed the packaging of the aircraft in Cubesats and so cubesats was used, the aircraft would be revealed like origami or expand to its full size. Another method is to spread the aircraft with balloons that will slow down the decrease in the screen and allow them to take off during optimal wind conditions. The same balloon can also be used to doubt the aircraft which makes them able to take off again for several flights. While this concept has not been adopted by NASA, a sailing plane developer is preparing to test the aircraft at 15,000 feet above sea level, where the Earth’s atmosphere is thinner and flight conditions are more similar to those on Mars. “We can use the earth as a laboratory to study flights on Mars,” Sergey Shkarayev, Professor of Arizona University and the first writer of the letter said.
A NASA engineer, in a partnership with the University of Arizona, has developed a motorcycle without motorcycles that can fly on Mars for days. Called ‘Sailplanes’, this new device will only use the wind for propulsion and will help in detailed studies of the mars atmosphere. According to Alexandre Kling, a researcher at the Mars…