NASA selects French Mars Microphone project for - Presse

Press release
Paris, 11 August 2016
PR141 - 2016
NASA selects French Mars Microphone
project for its Mars 2020 mission
NASA has announced the selection of Mars Microphone as one of the instruments for
its Mars 2020 mission. Developed by the ISAE aeronautics and space institute with
CNES oversight, Mars Microphone will be the first such sensor ever to operate on the
surface of Mars. The new instrument will be integrated into SuperCam, an enhanced
version of the ChemCam instrument that has been revealing the diversity of the red
planet’s geology on the Curiosity Mars rover for four years now.
Sitting on the Mars 2020 rover’s mast to take advantage of its unique pointing capability, Mars
Microphone is set to pursue a number of original science and technology objectives. Among these, it
will:
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Study the sounds generated by laser impacts on Martian rocks to better understand their
surface mechanical properties.
Seek to gain new insights into surface atmospheric phenomena such as wind turbulence, dust
devils and wind interactions with the rover.
Analyse the sound signature of the rover’s movements, for example when it is using its robot
arm, driving on flat or rugged terrain, and operating its pumps.
“This unique opportunity to hear for the first time sounds from Mars will add an extra dimension to the
images we are getting from its surface,” explains David Mimoun, ISAE associate professor and
principal investigator for Mars Microphone. Student projects will also be joining this technical and
scientific adventure.
According to Xavier Jacob, a lecturer and research scientist specializing in acoustics at Paul Sabatier
University’s PHASE laboratory: “If there were any Martians living there, they would most certainly have
big ears.” Indeed, the atmospheric conditions on Mars (pressure, temperature and composition) do not
favour the kind of acoustic propagation we are used to here on Earth. “That’s the main challenge facing
this instrument, with a whole new sound environment to be discovered,” he adds.
Mars Microphone will be integrated with SuperCam and delivered early in 2018 to the Los Alamos
National Laboratory (LANL) and then to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) end 2018, where it will be
mounted on the Mars 2020 rover. The mission will be launched in July 2020 and scheduled to land on
Mars in February 2021. Operations are planned to last until August 2023.
CNES is overseeing SuperCam, for which it is contributing to the design and will be involved in
operations on Mars. SuperCam is the result of close scientific cooperation between teams led by Dr
Roger Wiens at LANL and Dr Sylvestre Maurice at the IRAP astrophysics and planetology research
institute in Toulouse, France, with a contribution from the team of Professor Fernando Rull at Valladolid
University, Spain.
* French laboratories contributing to the SuperCam project
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ISAE-SUPAERO, DEOS, Space Systems for Planetology and its Applications
Midi-Pyrenees Observatory (Paul Sabatier Toulouse III University / CNRS / CNES / IRD / Meteo
France
IRAP astrophysics and planetology research institute (CNRS / Paul Sabatier University)
LESIA space and astrophysics instrumentation research laboratory (CNRS / Paris Observatory /
UPMC / Paris-Diderot University)
LAB astrophysics laboratory, Bordeaux (CNRS / Bordeaux University)
LATMOS atmospheres, environments and space observations laboratory (CNRS / UVSQ)
IAS space astrophysics institute (CNRS / Paris Sud University)
IPAG planetology and astrophysics institute, Grenoble (CNRS / Joseph Fourier University)
ISTerre Earth sciences institute (CNRS / Savoie University / Joseph Fourier University / IRD /
IFSTTAR)
IMPMC mineralogy, materials physics and cosmo-chemistry institute (CNRS / French Natural
History Museum, UPMC / IRD)
LPGN planetology and geodynamics laboratory, Nantes (CNRS / Nantes University / Angers
University)
LGLTPE Earth, planets and environment geology laboratory, Lyon (CNRS / Claude Bernard
Lyon I University / ENS Lyon)
LOMA waves and materials laboratory, Aquitaine (CNRS / Bordeaux University)
Georesources Laboratory (Lorraine University / CNRS / CREGU)
PHASE applied environmental human physics laboratory (Paul Sabatier University)
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CNES contacts
Pascale Bresson
Julien Watelet
Tel. +33 (0)1 44 76 75 39
Tel. +33 (0)1 44 76 78 37
[email protected]
[email protected]
Tel. +33 (0)7 62 19 83 09
[email protected]
ISAE-SUPAERO contacts
Elodie Auprêtre (Agence MCM)
presse.cnes.fr