TY - GEN
T1 - Vault-1 - A mission architecture for human exploration of near-earth objects
AU - Rabinovitch, Jason
AU - Goel, Ashish
AU - Niedzielska, Urszula
AU - Ganesan, Sriram
AU - Forman, Rachel E.
PY - 2012
Y1 - 2012
N2 - In 2011, the Keck Institute for Space Studies hosted the Caltech Space Challenge, a week long workshop/competition directed towards the President's initiative of sending astronauts to an asteroid by 2025. Two teams composed of 16 students each, representing 12 different nations, competed to prepare a mission proposal by the end of the week. This report highlights some of the work done by Team Voyager. Not only is this work useful in showing that a manned mission to a Near-Earth Object is feasible by 2025, but it also demonstrates the utility of intense, relatively short student competitions. This study is an outline of Vault-1, a proposed human mission to a Near-Earth Object. In addition to continuing human exploration, Vault-1 aims to make new discoveries about the origins of the Solar System, to develop technologies geared towards deep space exploration and a manned Mars mission, and to gain critical knowledge and experience to better protect Earth from future asteroid impacts. The primary target of this endeavor is 1999AO10, an asteroid that is larger than 30 m that also has an achievable mission duration of less than 200 days. 2000SG344 is a viable secondary target. Vault-1 will nominally carry 3 crew members to 1999AO10; after 14 days at the asteroid, the astronauts will return safely to the Earth with samples from the asteroid.
AB - In 2011, the Keck Institute for Space Studies hosted the Caltech Space Challenge, a week long workshop/competition directed towards the President's initiative of sending astronauts to an asteroid by 2025. Two teams composed of 16 students each, representing 12 different nations, competed to prepare a mission proposal by the end of the week. This report highlights some of the work done by Team Voyager. Not only is this work useful in showing that a manned mission to a Near-Earth Object is feasible by 2025, but it also demonstrates the utility of intense, relatively short student competitions. This study is an outline of Vault-1, a proposed human mission to a Near-Earth Object. In addition to continuing human exploration, Vault-1 aims to make new discoveries about the origins of the Solar System, to develop technologies geared towards deep space exploration and a manned Mars mission, and to gain critical knowledge and experience to better protect Earth from future asteroid impacts. The primary target of this endeavor is 1999AO10, an asteroid that is larger than 30 m that also has an achievable mission duration of less than 200 days. 2000SG344 is a viable secondary target. Vault-1 will nominally carry 3 crew members to 1999AO10; after 14 days at the asteroid, the astronauts will return safely to the Earth with samples from the asteroid.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85088723703&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85088723703&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.2514/6.2012-5113
DO - 10.2514/6.2012-5113
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85088723703
SN - 9781600869402
T3 - AIAA SPACE Conference and Exposition 2012
BT - AIAA SPACE Conference and Exposition 2012
T2 - AIAA SPACE Conference and Exposition 2012
Y2 - 11 September 2012 through 13 September 2012
ER -