Planetary Radio: Space Exploration, Astronomy and Science - Visiting Vesta Fiesta, With Pablo Gutierrez-Marques of the Dawn Mission

Episode Date: August 15, 2011

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Music Join us at Vesta Fiesta, this week on Planetary Radio. Music Welcome to the travel show that takes you to the final frontier. I'm Matt Kaplan of the Planetary Society. The Dawn spacecraft went into orbit around Vesta on July 15. Three weeks later, NASA and the Jet Propulsion Lab threw a party. We'll visit that celebration where we met Pablo Gutierrez Marquez,

operations manager for the only visible light camera on Dawn. You may have seen some of the spectacular images. It has already returned. Then we'll join Bruce Betts for a tour of the night sky. We've also got some space trivia contest answers that I think you'll get a kick out of. Up first is Emily Lakdawalla, the Planetary Society's Science and Technology Coordinator and the editor of its blog. Emily, this week I think we have to talk about Opportunity having finally reached its destination and beginning to look around.

Crater Endeavor. Yeah, it's really pretty amazing. If you hadn't been paying attention to the mission for very long, you'd think that somehow Opportunity had been transported to Spirit's landing site. Because all of a sudden we have rock types we've never seen before with Opportunity. It's recently just crawled up to a large flat-topped rock where the top is very bright. And it's possible, just speculating here, but it's possible that we're seeing some kind of vein of material where the rocks split open along that vein. And bright stuff is exciting stuff on Mars. So it'll be interesting to find out what that is.

Are you still thinking of this as almost what amounts to a new mission? Yeah, it really is a brand new mission for Opportunity. We're now in a geologic environment that's quite different to what Opportunity landed in Meridiani to study. So it might as well be a new mission, except that you have to remember that it's a new mission with a seven-year-old instrument package. And that does have its minuses, but it's going to be great. Let's turn now to a topic that I don't think you've taken up before on the blog, but it's a quite interesting entry.

And this has to do with the importance of press releases to people like you and me. Yeah, and I think that most people don't really realize how much the news cycle is driven by press releases. A press release is basically, it sounds like a news article. It's written by a public information officer of an organization, could be university, could be NASA. Press releases typically trigger news stories. So the reason that you see different media outlets all writing a story, a very similar sounding story on the same thing at the same time is because they all receive the same press release at the same time. And for science, you know, it does have its benefits to do this because the press releases are usually written in concert with experts who get the facts right. But I think there's a big minus, which is that the whole news cycle is driven not by journalists doing independent research, but by the what's

basically a marketing function of universities and NASA, you know, putting out there the news that they want people to report on. I recently stopped, or at least tried to stop writing much about press releases, mostly because I can't get to the news as fast as all of these other media outlets do. But it's nice to be able to dig up independent stories. Yeah, you make a point of talking about how some of the most interesting stories actually have to be dug up. That's right. And there's lots of places where, you know, it doesn't even take very much digging,

you can read the tables of contents of most professional journals online and find out all kinds of fascinating stuff that people are researching that never really gets into print. And Emily, since your blog is a major source for topics for this radio show, keep up the good work. Thank you, Matt. Emily Lachtwal is the science and technology coordinator for the Planetary Society and a contributing editor to Sky and Telescope magazine. Bill Nye is taking the week off. We'll be right back at Vesta Fiesta. The Jet Propulsion Lab started planning the celebration of Dawn's arrival at Vesta well before it actually got there. JPL booked the nearby Pasadena Convention Center in California,

asked the Planetary Society to help out, and invited the world to join the fun. When I dropped by on Saturday, August 6, the party was well underway, and Dawn had been orbiting the asteroid belt's second largest object for three weeks. There were booths representing many other NASA missions, but the focus was definitely on the little explorer that will eventually leave Vesta for even larger Ceres. Kids and parents were everywhere in the big room, many of them digging into hands-on demonstrations. One group had gathered around an odd metal device that sort of looked like a rocket engine, but not the kind of rocket engine we've grown used to.

My name is Chelsea Duttenhofer, and I am the ground data systems engineer on the Dawn project. But you're standing next to what appears to be the Ion engine. I am standing near the Ion engine. I've been a volunteer at Open House before and a lot of other JPL outreach, so I know a little bit about everything. Now, what is this? Is this just a model, or this isn't flight hardware, is it?

It's not flight hardware, but it is a full-scale engineering model. This particular unit was fired pre-launch in the vacuum chamber. So you can see there a little bit of discoloration on the screen here. I sure can. So it was actually used. So this is a mock-up of the real thing. We talk with Mark Raymond about this periodically on the radio show, and he always talks about how this is the miracle that's allowing Dawn to do what no spacecraft has ever done.

Right, right. No other spacecraft could have done this without ion propulsion. How long have you been with the mission? I've been with the mission for about three years. I started in about May of 2008. You must be really excited. I'm very excited. It's been a really fun experience. And how much of this kind of stuff have you done, just coming out and doing public contact like this, outreach? I volunteered at all the open houses, and any time that I hear that Dawn's doing an outreach like this, I think it's very important. I remember the people who got me interested in space when I was a kid, and I want to do the same thing for the next generation.

What kind of reaction are you getting from the kids here and their parents? Everyone thinks it's really cool. The ion propulsion is always a fun thing to talk about, So it's been really great. Thank you so much. Over on the main Vesta Fiesta stage, a member of the Dawn mission team was building a comet. She had brought along all the major ingredients, including a helping of dry ice that was turning to fog under her nose. Evaporation is when something goes from liquid to gas. What do we call it when something goes from solid to gas? Yes. Sublimation!

Sublimation! Okay, so it's already sublimating because at room temperature, dry ice is more volatile than regular ice. Pablo Gutierrez Marquez was pointed out to me while the comet recipe was still coming together. Pablo works for the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research. The institute provided the so-called framing camera for Dawn, and that's why this Spaniard who usually works in Germany has found himself on assignment at JPL in Southern California, where the multi-agency, multinational mission is managed.

Pablo is the framing camera flight or operations manager. Emily Lakdawalla actually discovered him before I did. You can read Pablo's excellent August 9 contribution to her blog at planetary.org. Pablo, I had to pull you away from that woman in there who was making a comment because you were just thrilled to watch that. Well, experimental science is always fun. Science doesn't have to be boring.

And, yeah, I actually enjoy science from a distant point of view because I'm just an engineer. So actually doing things work is my job. And when people do these kind of practical demonstrations, I have to say I'm thrilled to watch. What I really get a kick out of is that you looked almost as enthusiastic watching this little demo on a stage with dry ice as I bet you are with your camera approaching Asteroid Vesta. Well, I definitely am.

It's amazing. It's a feeling of discovery. It's an unseen world. You just go there. It's just, I, there was one day where I saw the images. There was kind of a big jump in resolution, and suddenly I couldn't hold myself. It was like mind-blowing, the images. It's really a small world, full of complexity, full of different features,

which is just surprising and amazing. Tell us about the framing camera. Well, the framing camera is pretty much a regular camera, only it's prepared to survive all this time in space. That means essentially that all materials are especially prepared to survive the radiation and the thermal conditions and to do this for an extended period of time. Otherwise, it's pretty average for a space instrument. It weighs around 5.5 kilos

and it has only 20 millimeters aperture. That's a tiny lens, like a quarter dollar coin, and a focal length of 150 millimeters. So essentially, you could carry it on your hand, but not on your pocket. And otherwise, it's a camera with a CCD sensor, and it has eight filters on it, one broadband that catches from the blue to the near infrared, and then seven narrowband filters that will allow us to do mineralogical survey. So we will not be able to identify minerals, but at least we will tell you variations in the composition,

and with this we will do you variations in the composition. And with this, we will do kind of a geological match. We will define which regions are similar in spectral properties and then working together with the VR team, we will pinpoint exactly which kind of material is each region. How excited are people, you, your colleagues, the science team as well, looking at these beautiful images of this object that we're seeing so much better than ever before. Well, all I have to say is whenever new images hit the ground, it's like new images, new images. And suddenly my office is full

with 20 people like, oh, show me the next one. Oh, wait a minute, flip back, flip these two, see how this moves and things like that. What's that thing there? Why is it dark? What's this boulder? Or how can this crater be so sharp? Or this one is blurred. There are so many things that essentially wear all over the images. Makes it hard to believe that once upon a time, there were scientists who questioned the value of cameras on spacecraft like yours.

Well, I have to say the biggest value, at least from my engineering point of view, is the ability of the cameras to thrill non-scientific people. Because you get another instrument, a magnetometer, a laser altimeter, and of course they have undoubtedly a strong scientific value, but it's very hard for the layman to understand that. But with a camera, the human being is so visual that if you can show him an image of what you're researching, he can figure out, he can imagine what it is, and that actually conveys the thrill of exploration, of discovery, also to the average people, which is in the end, who pays for these

missions. That's Pablo Gutierrez Marquez of the Dawn Mission. We'll spend more time with him in a minute. This is Planetary Radio. I'm Robert Picardo. I traveled across the galaxy as the doctor in Star Trek Voyager. Then I joined the Planetary Society to become part of the real adventure of space exploration. The Society fights for missions that unveil the secrets of the solar system. It searches for other intelligences in the universe, and it built the first solar sail. It also shares the wonder through this radio show, its website, and other exciting projects that reach around the globe. I'm proud to be part of this greatest of all voyages, and I hope you'll consider joining us. You can learn more about the Planetary Society at our website, planetary.org slash radio, or by calling 1-800-9-WORLDS.

Planetary Radio listeners who aren't yet members can join and receive a Planetary Radio t-shirt. Our nearly 100,000 members receive the internationally acclaimed Planetary Report magazine. That's planetary.org slash radio. The Planetary Society, exploring new worlds. Welcome back to Planetary Radio. I'm Matt Kaplan. I visited Vesta Fiesta on the first Saturday in August. The downtown Pasadena event attracted kids, parents, seniors, and lots of people working on Jet Propulsion Lab and other projects. The Dawn probe inspired the party. It's now settling into its science orbit around Vesta, the asteroid belt's second biggest object. the asteroid belt's second biggest object. Pablo Gutierrez Marquez is a member of the Dawn team.

He's in Southern California as flight manager for the spacecraft's framing camera, the only instrument aboard that can catch visible light images of the pockmarked, somewhat misshapen asteroid. Pablo was telling us before the break that the camera was largely there to satisfy the public's interest in up-close views. So I couldn't agree with you more about the importance for the layperson, but it is also an instrument to help with the science that's underway. And you mentioned some of the other instruments. How does the camera kind of fit into the whole family of instruments on Dawn? Well, the framing camera on Dawn has two missions. The first one, and most essential, is that it's the instrument to navigate because it's used for optical

navigation. We don't have a radar. We don't have a laser altimeter. So the only way to know exactly how far we are from Vesta is to take an image and measure how far we are by measuring the size. Which is why the very first images we saw of Vesta, just as a little dot, were from your camera. Yes, that's it. So that allowed us to first pinpoint the position of Vesta with respect to the background stars, and then now that we're in orbit, to have a precise orbit determination how far we are

and which position we are relative to Vesta, we do regularly this kind of optical navigation. But that's only the engineering part of the mission. The scientific part of the mission is that the framing camera is the instrument with the highest spatial resolution on board. So the gamma ray and neutron detector can detect gamma rays and neutrons, which we cannot, but it has a coarser resolution. And VIR also has way more precision in the spectral,

but it's only like one-third of the pixel size. And what should smooth that? I think you mentioned the acronym. The VIR, which is the Visual and Infrared Spectrometer. So they have very good spectral resolution, and they will be able to identify with high precision what the minerals are in a certain location. But because of their architecture, able to identify with high precision what the minerals are in a certain location but because of their of their architecture they will have a hard time to provide a global map a global view

so this is where the framing camera comes into play it gives you an general view of the contours which regions are in there which topographic features are, and with that you cross-check with the mineralogical information, and this way you get a mineralogical mapping. So you're providing a context in many ways. Yeah. Yeah, and on top of that there's a third mission, which is the topography. The only instrument that can provide topography information, how deep the craters are, how tall the mountains are, or the blurriness, the softness of craters is the framing camera.

So another very important part of the scientific mission is to give these stereo capabilities, giving images from different angles that will help us calculate the topography of Vesta. What's the health of the spacecraft in addition to your camera? Now that we're orbiting Vesta, there's still so much ahead for this spacecraft. Yeah, and from what I've heard, the health of the spacecraft is excellent. We have not been exempt from some minor hiccups, but all in all, we're good in track.

Our ion propulsion system, which is one of the major drivers, is doing better than expected. Actually, we made it to Vesta ahead of the schedule. And our solar panels are also producing more power than we predicted. So we expected they would degrade faster. They actually are holding better, and this gives us more power. This allows us to return more science, better images than we expected, and we're very, very excited about it. So we can definitely look forward to some great months of science at Vesta, and then on to Ceres. Yeah, that would be amazing.

The feeling of getting to Vesta for me was a first. I didn't actually know what to expect. When I saw the first image, I was thrilled. Now in 2015, this would be a repeat. It will be even more awesome because now I will be anticipating for weeks or months what's going to come. And then when it comes, it would be just as exciting. And even if it would be different, no doubt about it, but it would be very exciting as well. How long have you been with this mission? I've been working on DAW now for seven years.

So I joined the team shortly after the PDR, the Preliminary Design Review. So I was involved from the development of the engineering models. This first unit that do not fly, but they serve as demonstration that all the electronics, all the components can come together, communicate and be assembled in one piece. This unit, which is now at JPL and serves as a test purpose, well, actually, I helped build together, and I transported from Germany to here for final installation

on the spacecraft simulator. And since then, I've been doing thermal support. I've developed most of the scientific software on board the camera. And now I'm doing the operations. I'm in charge of ensuring that all the images that are requested make it to ground and then to the science team. And you've still got a big smile on your face. Are you having a good time?

Yeah, well, of course, we have hard times. Sometimes a hiccup happens. One month ago or so, we had a safing. The spacecraft went into safe mode. We were desolated because we were expecting once more another set of images, and all we got was a big nothing. And even concern. Because if we just don't get the images, it's bad.

But if you get concern on top, it's worse. You know, of course, that it's bad luck for any deep space spacecraft not to have a safing incident, because they all do. Yeah, it's kind of a curse. No, we've had a couple of those. And I have to say, I'm really grateful for the mission team. They're doing an excellent work at keeping the spacecraft on course and on time. And we're really grateful and happy

of working with them. Last thing, you said that at the press conference about a week ago, you met my colleague, Emily Lakdawalla, and she has pulled you into doing an entry for the Planetary Society blog. I'm honored to be allowed to do so. There's no doubt about it. We share a lot of interests, and I know your followers, as myself, are so thrilled about space exploration that I think it would be great to share my experiences in Dawn with your readers. I look forward to seeing your entry in the blog,

and I look forward to continuing to see your great images coming back from Vesta and later the biggest object in the Asteroid Belt series. Thanks so much, Pablo. You're welcome. Don, Framing Camera Operations Manager Pablo Gutierrez Marquez of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research. I talked with him at Vesta Fiesta in Pasadena, California. Bruce is up next. next. Bruce Betts is ready to talk to us via Skype, somewhere out there in the universe,

ready to look up and tell us about the night sky. And we're going to have some fun with the trivia contest. Got some fun answers to the question we gave you a couple of weeks ago. So we'll dive right into the galaxy there. Splash! Doing well. How are you doing, Matt? I'm okay, too. Kind of a milk bath there, huh? Oh, it's tasty, too. One percent. One percent. Back to the night sky. It's so Milky Way. Okay. In the night sky, Jupiter coming up super bright around 11 midnight, August 19th and 20th. You can check it out near the moon. We've also got Saturn getting a little tough to see down in the west shortly after sunset. Looking yellowish.

And Mars still dim, but it'll get brighter someday soon over in the east in the pre-dawn. Let us go on to this week in space history. It was a week for launches. We had Viking 1 launching in 1975 and Voyager 2 in 77. Or was that Viking 2 and Voyager 1? It was a good couple of years, I'll tell you that. Viking 1 and 2, Voyager 1 and 2, that was a nice time. Not as exciting in many ways as where we are now, but still not bad.

Those are four really good spacecraft. Yeah. I'm sorry, six if you count the fact that Viking 1 and 2 both dropped landers. I forgot about that. Yeah, the orbiters. So you had orbiters and landers. Yeah, excellent. Let us go on to Random Space Fact.

That in honor of the return of the Smurfs? I have no idea, but I did kind of turn blue while I was doing it. Curiosity. Not only did it kill the cat, it is also the name of the Mars Science Laboratory rover, and it is about twice as long and more than five times more massive than any previous Mars rover.

It's huge. Take it from someone who stood right across from it. I guess they have it on display somewhere right now. It must be at the Kennedy Space Center. They're allowing people to get a look at it once again. Let's hope that it begins a very successful trip to the red planet in November, I think, isn't it? Yes. The launch period opens in late November. I mean, it's like small car sized. Everybody always said, yeah, golf cart sized. And then I heard other people say VW bug.

No, not quite that large. I wonder if nuclear power would work for a VW bug. Totally. I mean, they already have the nuclear power in the back on Curiosity. That's right. They probably would catch on fire less frequently with an RTG powering them. Well, I'm pretty sure Curiosity does not employ a motor made of magnesium, but I'm not sure. I'm only talking about the old bugs, right, the air-cooled bugs. I'm told reliably that they're water-cooled now, so I'm sure that makes a big difference. Tough to find water for the radiator on Mars, though. It is. It's so hard. It's important water for the radiator on Mars, though. It is.

It's so hard. It's important to use the right coolant and bring it with you. We move on to the trivia contest because you've said we have some very humorous entries. You know, I was hoping the gang would do this even without me asking. I asked you what does TDRS stand for, T-D-R-S, in the space business? How'd we do, Matt, and what did people tell us? Quite well. I don't know if people just love this question or the fact that they could win,

in addition to a Planetary Radio t-shirt, a pale blue dot poster. People really turned out for this. I'm going to tell you the winner, first of all, and that came from, and I think he's a first-time winner, Lawrence Jordan of Astoria, Oregon. Yes, that's right. Lawrence of Astoria. Did he put that forward or did you? He actually provided that.

I wish I had thought of it myself. So, Lawrence, congratulations. You are the winner of both the shirt and the lovely pale blue dot poster he said tdrs stands for tracking and data relay satellite and i have to say before the others very important it's used for a space shuttle now space station communications so they don't have to be right over the place on the ground they're communicating to. They can send the signal up to a higher spacecraft or a set of them, and then they send them down. Okay, now, wow me, amuse me.

Mention, first of all, before we get to the funny stuff, that a lot of people pointed out, because there were some people who said, hey, what are they going to use them for now that the shuttle's gone? They're used for all kinds of things. Like you just said, the ISS, even balloons use the TDRS to communicate, apparently. So I was surprised by that. I have some toy airplanes that use it. It's very effective. The rubber band ones? Yes. Hey, Ron Kaltenbaugh. Ron Kaltenbaugh gets the first one. He, all these people also had the answer right. He said it stands for terrestrials downgraded for no replacement to the shuttle.

So that's timely, isn't it? This one from Ed Lupin down in San Diego. That damn radio show uttered by so many that Random.org has yet to smile on. They're referring to our show? I'm afraid so. Somewhat similar, although not as aggressive, from Anders Brolin, that deranged radio show. Especially the last segment every week. Okay, now here's my personal favorite.

Because after all, we mentioned a pale blue dot poster as part of the prize package. Paul Mantini in Toronto said, this dude respects Sagan. One way or the other, I'm calling our show T-dress from now on. That damn radio show. Oh, well. Nice work, folks. And listen, keep in mind that we always welcome your attempts to make us break up on the radio or podcast, depending on how you're hearing this. That damn podcast, it doesn't work as well, does it? Teed piss.

Oh, that's not good. That's not good. No. So anyway, why don't we go on to the next trivia contest. What is currently the fastest spacecraft leaving the solar system? So as of August 2011, the fastest spacecraft leaving the solar system relative to the sun or Earth, it'll be the same. Go to planetary.org slash radio. Find out how to enter.

You have until the 22nd of August at 2 p.m. Pacific Time, Monday the 22nd at 2 p.m. to get us that answer. I happen to know, I believe anyway, that the correct answer for this was covered. Didn't you put this in your Twitter, one of your tweets? There need to be

some benefits for being a follower of at random space fact. There you go. I'm sure there are other places to find this, but that's one excellent source. And we're all done. Alright everybody, go out there, look up at the night sky and think about tall buildings. Thank you and good night.

He's Bruce Batts, almost able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. He joins us every week here for What's Up. I've got it down to two bounds on the smaller ones. Faith Vilas wants to fly a telescope into space, and she plans to go with it. That's next time on Planetary Radio, which is produced by the Planetary Society in Pasadena, California, and made possible by a grant from the Kenneth T. and

Eileen L. Norris Foundation. Clear skies.