Asteroid Targets of Upcoming Spacecraft Missions

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Scientific paper

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Scientific paper

We propose 4 nights of CCD photometry on the 0.9m telescope to obtain rotational light curves and broad-band colors for two asteroids which are targets of upcoming spacecraft missions. Asteroid 1989 ML is the target of the Muses CN mission, a joint Japanese/United States effort to deploy a small rover vehicle on a near-Earth asteroid and to collect asteroid samples for return to Earth. Muses CN will be launched in July, 2002 and will rendezvous with 1989 ML in October, 2003. Asteroid 1992 KD is the target of the Deep Space 1 mission which will be launched in October, 1998 and will fly by the asteroid in July, 1999. Rotational periods for the asteroids are important for the design of the lander systems for Muses CN and for the design of operational scenarios for both missions. Combining rotation light curves with those obtained by other observers at other times allows one to estimate the pole direction of the asteroid, which is needed both to estimate the thermal environment of the Muses CN rover and for the design of orbital and sampling scenarios for the Muses CN mission. Broad-band colors allow identification of the compositional type for each asteroid, and allow one to search for compositional heterogeneity on hemispheric scales.

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