Space Maneuvers for Rosetta Lander
An upgraded version for more powerful devices can be downloaded:
SpaceManeuversTwo
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=hu.gloworm.spacemaneuverstwo
This application may be taken either - why not - for a somewhat thought-stimulating 3D 'video game', though governed by inviolable physical laws and some technical constraints, even so providing freedom of choice; or a demonstration of how the motion of bodies in space (uncontrolled ones, like planets, comets and controlled ones, like spacecrafts) is determined by the gravitational attraction and what an impact an atmosphere of a body can have on it; or how the Sun is orbiting and the illumination keeps changing from the perspective of an object at different places on the surface of an excentrically rotating (nutating, precessing) body; or, in inverse mode, where a 'shot' will land on Earth; or where it came from; or just a study for possible strategies of delivering the Rosetta lander onto the surface of a comet.
On approaching the comet CG/67P in 2014 a lander unit (Philae) will be ejected by the ROSETTA spacecraft. At the end of a relatively short descent phase it will land on the comet. In this application various lander push-off strategies can be flight dynamically modeled through 3D visual planning of spacecraft and lander flight orbits, by appropriate spacecraft maneuvers to be executed in the specific cometary atmosphere. The keplerian orbiting and the rotational, possible nutational, precessional motions of the comet are also modeled. These eventually complex motions will primarily determine the Sun and spacecraft orbits wrt. the lander at a particular site on the comet and several other post-landing operational conditions and constraints. Push the menu button of your tablet/phone for the User Manual and visit the listed web-sites for more about the ROSETTA mission.
Set parameters in this application so that spacecraft and the ejected lander fly their optimal orbits, the lander touches the eccentrically rotating comet with its legs 'downwards' at a pre-selected site, possibly 'vertically', at moderate velocity, in reasonable time from its separation on. Identify workable lander delivery strategies for various comet rotational kinematics, and in addition robust ones against slight variations of other relevant parameters. Execute additional spacecraft maneuvers, so that the spacecraft flies in the radio field of view of the - on/with the comet rotating - lander as long as possible. Keep the number of such maneuvers possibly at minimum. Rotate the landed lander around its vertical axis in order to collect the maximal solar energy during the course of a comet revolution.
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