Ralph Lorenz: The Dragonfly Mission to Titan

Saturn's giant moon Titan has been revealed to be remarkably Earth-like,
with a landscape of vast dunefields, river channels and lakes under a smoggy sky punctuated by methane downpours. Titan serves as a frigid laboratory in which the same processes that shape our own planet can be seen in action under exotic conditions. Titan has a rich inventory of complex organic molecules that may provide clues how the building blocks of life are
assembled. NASA recently selected APL's Dragonfly mission concept as the next $1B-class New Frontiers mission to launch in 2027, to arrive in the mid-2030s.
Dragonfly is an octocopter lander, able to repeatedly take off and fly tens of kilometers in Titan's dense atmosphere and low gravity to sample the surface in a wide range of geological settings. This presentation will describe the mission and how analog environments like the Arabian desert can inform us about the landscapes and processes Dragonfly will explore.

Видео Ralph Lorenz: The Dragonfly Mission to Titan канала Center for Space Science - NYU Abu Dhabi