SPACE.com -- Mars Odyssey Ready to Tackle Science Agenda

This picture shows both a visible and a thermal infrared image taken by the thermal emission imaging system on NASAs 2001 Mars Odyssey spacecraft on November 2, 2001.

Putting on the brakes. Mars Odyssey must fire its main engine for 20 minutes to slip into a correct initial orbit. Many weeks will follow of delicate aerobraking. Credit: NASA

Schematic breakdown of Mars Odyssey

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	Mars Odyssey Ready to Tackle Science Agenda By Leonard David Senior Space Writer posted: 07:00 am ET 21 January 2002

odyssey_update_020117

RENO, NEVADA NASAs Mars Odyssey is ready to start science duties as it circles the Red Planet. The spacecraft completed a set of aerobraking maneuvers January 11 following weeks of dipping in and out of Mars thin atmosphere in order to tighten its orbit around the planet.

An upcoming and key event is deployment of Odysseys high-gain antenna. That equipment is crucial in relaying to Earth quantities of data to be gleaned by the spacecrafts science instruments. The antenna is to be released and deployed with a motor-driven hinge.

Release of the high-gain antenna is to occur after a final adjustment of Odysseys orbit takes place. That small adjustment is tagged an "orbit freeze" maneuver. This tweaking of Odysseys orbit is being done to avoid the remote chance it could smack into another orbiting spacecraft the Mars Global Surveyor.

Serve up surprises

Steve Saunders, project scientist for the 2001 Mars Odyssey mission, expects the probe will serve up surprises in regards to its main agenda spotting the signature of water on the reddish globe.

"The spacecraft has been working extremely well. That is what the engineers are saying. My assessment is that theyve been performing extremely well in flying Mars Odyssey," Saunders told SPACE.com during the 40^th American Institute of Aeronautics & Astronautics (AIAA) Aerospace Sciences meeting held here last week.

Saunders said the Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS) aboard Odyssey "looks like its working great," and is ready to start operations. THEMIS is designed to determine the distribution of minerals, particularly those that can only form in the presence of water. Once the high-gain antenna is deployed, all is in ready for THEMIS to start pumping to Earth volumes of data, he said.

THEMIS was tested shortly after the Mars Odyssey was launched in April 2001. The instrument was also briefly used during aerobraking maneuvers.

Another instrument, the Gamma Ray Spectrometer (GRS) is on tap to begin its task of determining the presence of 20 chemical elements on the surface of Mars. The GRS can scan for hydrogen in the shallow subsurface, thereby ascertaining the amount and distribution of possible water ice on the planet.

Early targets

During the first month or six weeks of science operation at Mars, Odyssey is to start looking at high-priority targets, Saunders said.

Potential landing areas for NASAs 2003 Mars Exploration Rovers are to be viewed.

"Weve got a number of other high-priority targets that are of great interest to people in general," Saunders said. Those include the top of Olympus Mons, Valles Marineris, and the so-called "Face on Mars" a site that some claim to be of artificial nature.

"Were going to try to cover all that in the first month or so, and release the data immediatelyand just get it out there," Saunders told SPACE.com.

"Theres always a sense, true or not, that were not getting it [data] out fast enough. Its not always the fault of any particular investigator or mission. It just has to do with planning and money," Saunders said. "Were going to try and solve that by giving out what may be the most interesting stuff in general as soon as we can," he said.

End of year results

By years end, Mars Odyssey is likely to have painted a good picture regarding the distribution of near surface hydrogen on Mars using a suite of sensors.

"I think we should have a pretty good picture of the high latitude regions in terms of their chemical composition. We wont have sampled enough around the equator, but we should have a pretty good picture what the polar regions look like. Well have a whole bunch of nice images from THEMISand by then we should have done the analysis of some areas to come up with some interesting deposits on Mars," Saunders said.

"We always get a lot of surprises, especially when we do a huge jump in resolution as we do with THEMIS," Saunders said. "So I think well see some things that we didnt expect."

Odysseys primary science mission is slated to continue through July 2004.

During and after its science mission, the Odyssey orbiter will also support other missions in NASAs Mars Exploration program. It will provide the communications relay for U.S. and international landers, including the next mission in the space agencys Mars Program, the Mars Exploration Rovers to be launched in 2003. Scientists and engineers will also use Odyssey data to identify potential landing spots for future Mars missions.

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