The Ballistic Deployment of Asteroid Landers

Master thesis (2015)

Authors

Contributors

E. Mooij (mentor)
D. Scheeres (mentor)
Programme
Space Exploration (Aerospace Engineering) (TU Delft)
Copyright: © 2015 Van wal, S.
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Published Date

05-01-2015

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Programme

Space Exploration

Abstract

The deployment of passive, spherical lander pods provides a low-cost, low-risk technique for measuring the (sub-)surface of asteroids and comets. In this masters thesis, we numerically investigate the feasibility of such pods through the development of simulation software. This software models the complex gravity field of asteroids, as well as collisions, contact motion, and rocks on the surface. After performing extensive verification and validation, we test deployment to the unitary asteroid 25143 Itokawa and the binary system 1999 KW4.