8/3/2019 Cupido - Biochemical and Basic Geophysical Field Study of Mars - Orange Team 2007

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European Space Agency

European Mars Science and Exploration Conference: Mars Express & ExoMars

ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, 12 - 16 November, 2007

CUPIDO: Biochemical and Basic Geophysical Field Study of Mars Orange Team, Summer School Alpbach

2007 Collaboration, presented by D. Heinzeller1, R. Higgins

2.

1Institut fr Theoretische Physik und Astrophysik,

Leibnizstr. 15, 24118 Kiel, Germany.2Department of Experimental Physics, National University of Ireland

Maynooth, Maynooth, Co. Kildare, Ireland. hd@astrophysik.uni-kiel.de

Context: Of all the celestial bodies in the solarsystem, Mars has held a unique status in human

interest from the beginning. The current search for

past and present life beyond Earth is primarily fo-

cused on the red planet. The proximity of Mars to

the present habitable zone around the sun would

appear to have granted it many key ingredients for

the formation and evolution of life, at least to our

present understanding i.e. internal activity providing

a heat source and driving an internal dynamo, the

existence of an atmosphere and possibly liquid wa-

ter. Past and present missions to Mars have revealed

promising discoveries like atmospheric CO2 con-

centrations similar to those found on Earth2, watervapor in the atmosphere

7and water channels on the

surface1. Key questions on the internal structure and

especially the habitability of the subsurface, which

may be protected from destructive radiation, still

remain unanswered.

Aims: At the Summer School Alpbach 2007 on

Astrobiology, the Orange Team designed a mission

to Mars which will broaden our understanding of the

planet. For the first time, biochemical analysis of the

subsurface to a depth of 3-5m will reveal trace bio-

markers and examine the habitability potential at

different layers. Concurrent seismological experi-

ments will investigate the internal structure to amuch greater depth than those previously done (e.g.

MARSIS4). Spectroscopic measurements observed

within the scope of natural and controlled conditions

will also contribute to our knowledge of the plane-

tary atmosphere and surfaces composition.

Methods: Based on an existing mission concept

(Mars-966), two scientific stations will penetrate at

separate sites to a depth of 3-5m into the Martian

surface. Onboard, the biochemical package

CHEMOVITA will detect organic molecules, geo-

logical particles and sugars along with investigating

isotopic ratios, oxidation states of molecules, the

acidity of the soil and the environmental conditions

of three different depths, down to 5m, below the

surface.

The scientific stations will also contain highly

sensitive seismometers located at their heads and

hence buried deeply in the Martian ground. Addi-

tionally, two small seismic stations (based on the

Deep Space 2 design5) will be placed close to one of

the scientific stations in a triangular formation

which will set up a seismographic network on Mars

for the first time (Figure 1: Proposed landing sites

for individual components). An artificial impact

with known strength and location will be created by

crashing an impactor into the center of this network.

This will provide a standard measurement for seis-

mographic activity which will continue to be moni-tored for one Earth year.

Observation of the ejected plume of this impact

with a visible-infrared spectrometer onboard the

orbiter will reveal the composition, in particular the

concentrations of water and methane, of the ejected

surface material. Conducted from the orbiter, spec-

troscopic measurements of the atmosphere and sur-

face will continue at least as long as the seismic

experiments.

Conclusions: The CUPIDO mission will search

for extinct and extant life on mars. It will address

key questions on the habitability of the subsurface

and the internal composition of the planet in aunique and multifaceted way. We propose the

mission as a successor to ExoMars3

and expect its

scientific return to be invaluable to the success of

any sample return or manned mission.

Figure 1. Proposed landing sites based on current know-

ledge and mission objectives. Yellow triangles: scientific

stations; red stars: seismic stations; blue circle: impactor.

References:1Ambard, A., Mouginis-Mark, P.J. (2007),

Seventh Inter-national Conference on Mars, held July 9-

13, 2007 in Pasadena, California,LPIC 1353, Abs. #3043.2Cottini, V., Formisano, V., Grassi, D., Ignatiev,

N.I. (2006), in: Second workshop on Mars atmos-

phere modelling and observations (Eds. Forget, F.,et al.), held February 27-March 3, 2006 in Granada,

Spain.3Kminek, G., Vago, J.L. (2004), LPSC, held March

15-19, 2004 in League City, Texas, Abs. #1111.4Picardi, G., Biccari, D., Cartacci, M., and 17 co-

authors (2007),MSAIS 11, 15.5Smrekar, S., Catling, D., Lorenz, R., and 8 co-

authors (1999),JGR 104, 27.6Surkov, Y.A., Kremnev, R.S. (1998), P&SS 46,

1689-1696.7Titov, D.V., Markiewicz, W.J., Thomas, N., Keller,

H.U., Sablotny, R.M., Tomasko, M.G., Lemmon,

M.T., Smith, P. H. (1999),JGR 104, 9019-9026.