OKC Astronomy Club Meeting - Friday, March 14th - Pi Day! 7:00 PM
Location: Science Museum of Oklahoma Auditorium
Presenter: Dr. Marc Rayman, NASA/JPL will be joining us by ZOOM.
Title: “To Boldly Go… Well, You Know: NASA’s Dawn Mission to the Main Asteroid Belt”
Abstract:
The ambitious and exciting Dawn mission was one of NASA’s most remarkable ventures into the solar system. The spacecraft completed a dramatic exploration of Vesta in 2011-2012 and conducted a spectacular mission at Ceres from 2015 until late 2018. These were among the last uncharted worlds in the inner solar system prior to Dawn. They are the two largest residents of the main asteroid belt, that vast collection of bodies between Mars and Jupiter. Ceres is so large that it is included in the category of dwarf planets, along with Pluto.
Dawn is the only spacecraft ever to orbit a dwarf planet and is the only one ever to orbit any two extraterrestrial destinations. Such a mission would have been impossible without the use of ion propulsion, a technology that had largely been in the domain of science fiction before Dawn.
Marc Rayman, who was the mission director and chief engineer (as well as a lifelong space enthusiast), will describe the mission and its unique use of ion propulsion as well as its two exotic destinations. He also will share the excitement and profundity of controlling a spacecraft in deep space.
