Landing on Mars is laborious , but the European Space Agency ’s first attempt — the Beagle 2 investigation — came maddeningly close to being a success . In fact , a new 3D modeling psychoanalysis shows that the lander ’s loser to pass with the Earth was belike due to a single jammed solar control panel .
A British space probe designed to hunt for sign of life on Mars , Beagle 2 was launch aboard ESA ’s Mars Express spacecraft in June 2003 . It was released from its mothership on December 19th and scheduled to land on the Red Planet six day afterward . But Beagle 2 ’s Christmas twenty-four hours phone call home from Mars never came — and subsequent searches by Mars Express and NASA ’s Mars Odyssey were unable to locate the lander .
For more than a X , its fate continue a mystery .
In tardy 2014 , after nearly everyone had given up on the deep in thought lander , Beagle 2 was distinguish in a serial publication of eight images submit by the HiRISE camera on NASA ’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter . The blurry , pixelated exposure showed what seem to be an entire lander , along with its chute and hotness shell nearby . But even after apply advanced range of a function processing technique , scientists were ineffective determine the configuration of the lander — the photos were simply too low firmness of purpose . The interrogation of what the hell went wrong remain open .
But Mark Sims , a prof of space biology at the University of Leicester and former mission coach for Beagle 2 , was n’t about to let the mystery go , not after obtaining photographic evidence of a successful landing . “ Call it stubbornness , if you like , ” he told Gizmodo . “ In the end , all of this is about trying to figure out exactly what happened to Beagle 2 . ”
An mind came to Sims one evening last fall , toward sunset , after tracing the source of a shiny glimmer in his lounge to the reflection of a window down the route . “ I looked at that light source and conceive , there ’s info here about what I ’m seeing , ” he said . Specifically , Sims start thinking about how the visual aspect of an object can change drastically with the angle of the sun .
The HiRISE images of Beagle 2 were all taken at different sun slant , and in each of them , the lander reflects light in a slightly dissimilar way . And so , Sims started to wonder : if the Beagle 2 lander could be feign under unlike kindling conditions , could one work out its configuration on the control surface ?
“ It ’s an sure-enough approximation , in a signified , ” Sims said . “ But I did n’t have the knowledge or engineering to do the analysis . ”
As luck would have it , a friend of Sims ’ introduced him to someone who did : Nick Higgett , a investigator at De Montfort University whose lab use advanced three-D modeling techniques to rebuild historical land site around Leicester .
take aim Sim ’s “ reflection analysis ” concept , Higget and his squad fabricate a 3D model of the Beagle 2 lander , which is shaped like a clam shell and opens in half before unroll four solar panels on one side . They model the lander in several unlike shape , with one , two , three , or all four solar panel deploy . The role model was then scaled down to the pixel resolution of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter ’s ikon , and bathed in practical sunlight at different angles . Finally , its reflection patterns were compare with real images of Beagle 2 captivate by Hi - RISE .
“ We looked at a lot of different form in our simulations and see which was most consistent across a number of [ Hi - climb ] images , ” Higget told Gizmodo . “ There was a lot of trial and error . ”
Eventually , the researchers determined that the best equal between real and imitation reflexion design was one in which Beagle 2 had three of its four solar panel deploy , although a four control board scenario was also possible .
“ This corroborate that the Beagle 2 ’s entry , descent and landing system work , ” said Sims , who is presently writing up the finding for publication . “ It got down to the surface , and it was intact . Furthermore , it was within one solar panel of being to the full deployed and to the full operating . ”
All four of the Beagle 2 ’s solar panels need to open before an RF communication antenna could bug out out and send signals back to Earth . So , if the the three - control board scenario is right , that explain why we never heard from the lander . If all four of the jury did deploy , there must have been some other technical job . It could have been as minor as a bad electrical wire or a loose ass .
“ I suspect , break what we ’ve take in from anterior data point analysis back in 2015 , it ’s the three - control board scenario , ” Sims said . “ But if all four jury did assailable , we were torturously close to get a work spacecraft on the surface of Mars . ”
We may never incur out on the dot what conk out improper with Beagle 2 , although Sims is bang-up to do more pretending if he invite the funding . Higget notes that his squad ’s newly devised technique could be applicable to other situations where scientist are trying to sympathize a extremely - pensive object on the surface of a different planet or even in a distant country on Earth .
Unfortunately , reflection psychoanalysis wo n’t be applicable to the European Space Agency ’s latterly - crash Schiaparelli lander , which impacted the surface at a very high speed and seemed to explode , leaving nothing but a glowering burn mark Deutschmark . “ That was a capital disaster for the squad , and I feel profoundly for them , ” Sims allege . “ But it was manifestly a crash . ”
Beagle 2 , meanwhile , obviously was n’t a crash . And while it may seem a mo arcane to proceed puzzling over the pixelated reflections of a simple machine that die on Mars more than a decade ago , who knows ? Maybe in those glimmer , we ’ll learn something that ’ll keep the next outer space probe active .
MarsScienceSpacespace historySpaceflight
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