In-situ geochemical investigations of planetary surfaces using compact geochemistry packages.

Details In-situ geochemical investigations of planetary surfaces using compact geochemistry packages. In-situ geochemical investigations of planetary surfaces using compact geochemistry packages.

Apr 2003

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2003eaeja....10513b&link_type=abstract

EGS - AGU - EUG Joint Assembly, Abstracts from the meeting held in Nice, France, 6 - 11 April 2003, abstract #10513

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Since sample return from Mars and other planetary bodies have been deferred to the far future, in-situ measurements have again become crucial for surface explorations, again. Geochemical measurements belong to the basic exploration of planetary surfaces. To address this need, a geochemical package, dubbed SAGA, was proposed for the exploration of rocks, dust or regolith. SAGA (Small Advanced Geochemistry Assembly) comprises of chemical, mineralogical, and optical instruments located in a small, light-weight box. An Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) determines the chemical composition, a Mössbauer Spectrometer (MB) measures the mineralogical composition, and a camera provides microscopic images. Flight versions of APXS and MB also will be part of the ‘Athena payload’ of the upcoming two NASA ‘Mars Exploration Rovers (MER)’. APXS and MB are attached to the instrument deployment device (IDD), a robotic arm, of the large rovers. Together with an American microscopic imager and a rock abrasion tool (RAT) a new way of combining several instruments and sampling of fresh rock surfaces will be achieved. The MER APXS is a new generation of instrument taking advantage of recent improvements in solid-state x-ray detector developments. The flight units were recently calibrated in Martian simulation chambers demonstrating their superior performance in energy resolution and sensitivity compared to the former Mars Pathfinder APXS. SAGA will be a very versatile, small package that can be attached to any robotic arm of a lander or a rover on future planetary missions either to Mars, Moon, or Mercury. Because of its low weight (<2 kg) it even can be carried by a micro-rover to extend the exploration radius of small landers (<100 kg).

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