On November 12th 2014, the Rosetta spacecraft will attempt to make history by deploying its lander, Philae, onto the surface of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The $1.6 billion mission will provide humanity with its first glimpse of the physical make up of a comet.
On November 4 2014, the European Space Agency announced that the landing site on comet 67P, formally known as Site J, had been renamed, Agilkia, which is the name of an island in the Nile river.
The landing is scheduled to begin at 8:35am on November 12th and it is expected to take Philae 7 hours to reach the comets surface. Confirmation of the lander's touchdown is expected to be about 4:00 pm. While Philae descends it will take pictures and perform experiments.
Once Philae lands, it will begin another series of experiments that may help in unraveling the composition of comets. A drill will take tiny pieces of comet into the lander where they will be tested by several devices. A gas chromatograph mass spectrometer will analyze the ratios of the different isotopes of carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, and other elements found on comet P67. The Rosetta spacecraft will monitor all of Philae's activities while it orbits comet P67.
Scientists are hopeful that they will find evidence of amino acids, which are the building blocks of life. If so, it will confirm that comets brought those building blocks to the Earth. Other experiments may confirm that comets also brought water to the Earth. Proof of both could mean that life did indeed come from space.
No comments:
Post a Comment