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Space telescope search the most difficult to find asteroids and comets that stray into Earth’s orbital

A space telescope designed to search for the most difficult-to-find asteroids and comets that stray into Earth’s orbital vicinity, NASA’s Near-Earth Object Surveyor (NEO Surveyor) recently underwent a rigorous technical and program review. Now the mission is moving into the final design and production phase, establishing its technical, cost and planning basis.

The mission supports the goals of NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO) at NASA Headquarters in Washington. The NASA Authorization Act of 2005 directed NASA to discover and characterize at least 90% of near-Earth objects greater than 140 meters (460 ft) in diameter that are within 30 million miles (48 million kilometers) of our planet’s orbit. Objects of this size are capable of causing significant regional damage, or worse if they hit Earth.

“NEO Surveyor represents a new generation of NASA’s ability to rapidly detect, track and characterize potentially hazardous near-Earth objects,” said Lindley Johnson, NASA’s planetary defense officer at PDCO. “Ground-based telescopes continue to be essential for us to constantly monitor the sky, but the Space Infrared Observatory is the ultimate vantage point that will enable NASA’s planetary defense strategy.”

Operated by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, NEO Surveyor will travel a million miles to the region of gravitational stability — called the L1 Lagrange point — between Earth and the Sun, where the probe will orbit during its five-year primary mission. From this location, NEO Surveyor will observe the solar system in infrared wavelengths – light that is invisible to the human eye. Because these wavelengths are mostly blocked by Earth’s atmosphere, larger ground-based observatories may miss near-Earth objects that this space telescope will be able to record with its modest light-gathering aperture of nearly 20 inches (50 centimeters).

NEO Surveyor will be able to find asteroids

NEO Surveyor’s cutting-edge detectors are designed to observe two heat-sensitive infrared bands that have been specifically chosen to allow the spacecraft to track the most challenging near-Earth objects, such as dark asteroids and comets that don’t reflect much of the visible. light. In the infrared wavelengths to which NEO Surveyor is sensitive, these objects glow because they are heated by sunlight.

In addition, NEO Surveyor will be able to find asteroids that approach Earth from the direction of the Sun, as well as those that lead and follow our planet’s orbit where they are usually obscured by the glare of sunlight – objects known as Earth Trojans.

“For the first time in the history of our planet, Earthlings are developing methods to protect Earth by deflecting dangerous asteroids,” said Amy Mainzer, director of mission exploration at the University of Arizona in Tucson. “But before we can fend them off, we have to find them first. NEO Surveyor will be a game changer in this endeavor.”

The mission will also help characterize the composition, shape, rotation and orbit of near-Earth objects. Although the mission is primarily focused on planetary defense, this information can be used to better understand the origin and evolution of asteroids and comets that formed the ancient building blocks of our solar system.

Upon launch, NEO Surveyor will build on the successes of its predecessor, the Broadband Infrared Survey of Near-Earth Objects (NEOWISE). NEOWISE, which was redeveloped from the WISE Space Telescope after that mission ended in 2011, has proven highly effective at detecting and characterizing near-Earth objects, but NEO Surveyor is the first space mission built specifically to find large numbers of these dangerous asteroids and comets.

After the mission passed

After the mission passed this milestone on November 29, development of the key instruments began. For example, large radiators are produced to enable passive cooling of the system. To detect the faint infrared glow of asteroids and comets, the instrument’s infrared detectors must be much cooler than the spacecraft’s electronics. Radiators will perform this important task, eliminating the need for complex active cooling systems.

In addition, construction has begun on the composite struts that will separate the telescope’s instrumentation from the spacecraft. The struts, which are designed to be poor conductors of heat, will insulate the cold instrument from the warm spacecraft and sun shield, the latter of which will block sunlight that might otherwise obscure the telescope’s view of near-Earth objects and heat the instrument.

Progress has also been made in the development of the instrument’s infrared detectors, beam splitters, filters, electronics and housing. And work has begun on the space telescope’s mirror, which will be formed from a solid block of aluminum and shaped with a custom-made diamond turning machine. “The project team, including all of our institutional and industry collaborators, is already very busy designing and manufacturing the components that will eventually become the flight hardware,” said Tom Hoffman, NEO Surveyor project manager at JPL. “As the mission enters this new phase, we are excited to be working on this unique space telescope and look forward to our launch and the beginning of our important mission.”

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