Lunar, Planetary, and Small-Body Exploration
A special issue of Aerospace (ISSN 2226-4310). This special issue belongs to the section "Astronautics & Space Science".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 March 2025 | Viewed by 75
Special Issue Editor
Interests: space robotics; spacecraft swarms; extreme environment exploration; neural networks; evolutionary computation; fuel cell power supplies; planetary rovers; spacecraft trajectory design; on-orbit servicing; docking; in-situ resource utilization (ISRU)
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
In the last 70 years, we have seen increasingly sophisticated robotic spacecraft, landers, rovers, and other vehicles explore the solar system's eight planets and Pluto. These crafts have been instrumental in uncovering the origins and evolution of our solar system. Further investigations are needed to solve some remaining mysteries, particularly the past and present habitability of bodies in the solar system. Advances in electronics, computation, communications, sensing, and power have led to long-lasting missions that send a rich portfolio of scientific data through pictures, videos, and sounds. Some of the latest rovers carry complex mobile laboratories to perform geo-chemical analysis in the field. In addition, they carry smaller craft like helicopters or mobile sensor units that can take on more risk than the mothercraft. The latest wave of advances has seen small spacecraft take a foothold in the space exploration world. These crafts are a fraction of the size and cost of older spacecrafts but carry increasingly sophisticated instruments and data processing capabilities. These new form factors also facilitate the agile deployment of spacecrafts that can operate in a decentralized manner; several of these spacecrafts can perform formation flight to perform coordinated observation and mapping of one or more science targets. In other cases, decentralized swarms of spacecraft have been proposed for flyby-reconnaissance missions. These crafts use new and advanced instruments to peer at the surface and beneath the surface of planets, moons, and asteroids, obtain samples, and even perform impact studies. In another thrust, we see the advancement of missions that utilize a planetary atmosphere to float, fly, and soar to new targets that are otherwise inaccessible using conventional landers and rovers.
Dr. Jekanthan Thangavelautham
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- agile spacecraft
- planetary exploration
- mothercraft
- formation flight
- swarms
- planetary atmosphere
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