Mars Curiosity Rover Analysis

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David Nakamoto ESS 102 9 March 2015 I propose a plan to send a rover to Titan. It is a great source of information and there has already been a mission to the surface. A cost estimate would be between 4 or 5 billion dollars. Although this would be the main mission, it would be wise to send another orbiter and probe to Titan first. The mission of that would be to better observe and test the surface of Titan before sending a rover. That could help save costs in the long run and still gain plenty of information. There is so much that we do not know about Titan that could be learned from sending a rover to the surface. The instruments that would be used for this mission would be the same as the Mars Curiosity rover. The Curiosity rover…show more content…
Curiosity also had a CheMin, which is an instrument to identify minerals in rocks and soil [1]. There was also the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer, which measures the abundance of various elements [1]. These would all be useful in analyzing the surface of Titan. There was a high resolution camera on a mast as well as the Mars Hands Lens Imager, which was connected to the arm and took close up photos [1]. These cameras would give better pictures of what Titan looks like, along with allowing the scientists to choose what is more interesting to explore into on Titan. Along with normal cameras, there was an instrument called a ChemCam, which uses a laser to vaporize surface layers of nearby rocks and then uses a spectrometer to measure the materials in the debris [1]. This is useful to be able to break apart rocks and analyze the insides. There was also a Radiation Assessment Detector, to see how the radiation is, and a Rover Environmental Monitoring Station, which monitors weather [1]. These are going to be important in order to send manned missions to Titan. Lastly, it had a Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons experiment, which looked for ice or water below the surface [1].…show more content…
This would make the cost to be similar, but more expensive, to that of the Curiosity mission, which was 2.5 billion dollars [1]. It would cost considerable more due to the large difference in distance from Earth and Mars, and Earth and Titan. The Cassini orbiter cost about 3.27 billion dollars [2]. Although that mission was not solely to go to Titan it did send a probe to Titan’s surface, which means it would cost similarly to this mission. Considering the similarities, the estimate of 4 to 5 billion dollars is a little high, but considering how much more fuel will be needed to reach Titan and how much more time is going to be needed to monitor the rover that cost is reasonable. Although this would be a huge cost, it the about of data that could be gained is worth
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