NASA new CubeSat concept for planetary exploration
Jaime Esper, a technologist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center has developed a CubeSat concept that would allow scientists to use less-expensive cubesat (tiny-satellite) technology to observe physical phenomena beyond the current low-Earth-orbit limit.
The CubeSat Application for Planetary Entry Missions (CAPE) concept involves a service module that would propel the spacecraft to its target and a separate planetary entry probe that could survive a rapid dive through the atmosphere of an extraterrestrial planet, all while reliably transmitting scientific and engineering data.
Esper and his team are planning to test the stability of a prototype entry vehicle, the Micro-Reentry Capsule (MIRCA), this summer during a high-altitude balloon mission from Fort Sumner, New Mexico.
