Robotic Exploration of the Solar System (eBook)

Part I: The Golden Age 1957-1982

David M. Harland, Paolo Ulivi (Autoren)

eBook Download: PDF

2007 | 1. Auflage
LX, 536 Seiten
Springer New York (Verlag)
978-0-387-73983-0 (ISBN)

Infos

This fascinating book is a must-have text for space enthusiasts with an engineering bent. It is a detailed history of unmanned missions that have explored our solar system. The subject is treated wherever possible from an engineering and scientific standpoint and includes technical descriptions of the spacecraft, their mission designs and their instrumentations. Scientific results are discussed in depth, together with details of mission management. The book is fantastically comprehensive, covering missions and results from the 1950s right up to the present day. Some of the latest missions and their results appear in a popular science book for the first time.

The Second World War left among its many and painful heritages a new technology, ballistic missiles, that was to change the world, providing a way to carry into space instruments, satellites and probes that revolutionized science and technology.

Prior to launching artificial satellites, both the then Soviet Union and the United States developed more powerful intercontinental missiles with a range of thousands of miles. In the 1950s, the Soviets designed the huge 8K71 'Semiorka' (little seven, after the military designator R 7), a single staged rocket equipped with four large boosters and able to carry an heavy thermonuclear warhead to the continental US. In the USA, competition between the different armed forces prevailed, and the Army developed the medium range Redstone and Jupiter missiles, whilst the Air Force developed the Thor and two different ICBMs, Atlas and Titan and the Navy developed the Polaris submarine launched missiles.

The potential of all of these rockets to boost spacecraft were huge, but while in the Soviet Union it was decided to modify an 8K71 to carry a scientific payload into space, the United States decided that the Navy would develop a tiny new rocket called Vanguard, specifically designed for the task. This decision was to have grave repercussions: on 4 October 1957 the Soviet Union launched its PS-1 satellite, better known as Sputnik, which rocked the USA. This was compounded a month later by the launch of the PS-2, carrying the dog Laika. Following the explosion of the first Vanguard on December 6, the US Army then had the task to restore the American confidence by successfully carrying Explorer 1 into space on 1 February 1958 using the modified Redstone rocket called Juno 1. During the same year, the superpowers started working on new versions of their missiles able to carry small payloads to the Moon and, potentially, to the near planets. The space race had begun.

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Paolo Ulivi and David Harland provide in Robotic Exploration of the Solar System a detailed history of unmanned missions of exploration of our Solar System. As in their previous book Lunar Exploration, the subject will be treated wherever possible from an engineering and scientific standpoint. Technical descriptions of the spacecraft, of their mission designs and of instrumentations will be provided. Scientific results will be discussed in considerable depth, together with details of mission management. The book will be comprehensive, covering missions and results from the 1950s until the present day, and some of the latest missions and their results will appear in a popular science book for the first time. The authors will also cover many unflown missions, providing an indication of the ideas that proved to be unfulfilled at the time but which may still be proven and useful in the future.  The project will deliver three volumes totaling over 1000 pages, providing comprehensive coverage of the topic.

Inhalt

Table of Contents 6
List of Illustrations 8
List of tables 15
Foreword 16
Author's preface 18
Acknowledgements 19
Introduction 21
1 The beginning 57
2 Of landers and orbiters 152
3 The grandest tour 355
Glossary 527
Appendices 534
Chapter references 546
Further reading 591
Index 593

Textauszug

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Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 8.12.2007
• Reihe/Serie: Space Exploration
• Reihe/Serie: Springer Praxis Books
• Zusatzinfo: LX, 536 p.
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Natur / Technik ► Weltraum / Astronomie
• Themenwelt: Informatik ► Theorie / Studium ► Künstliche Intelligenz / Robotik
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Physik / Astronomie ► Astronomie / Astrophysik
• Themenwelt: Technik ► Elektrotechnik / Energietechnik
• Themenwelt: Technik ► Luft- / Raumfahrttechnik
• Schlagworte: planetary probes • Popular science • robot • Solar • Solar System • space books • space probes • unflown missions • Unmanned Missions
• ISBN-10: 0-387-73983-1 / 0387739831
• ISBN-13: 978-0-387-73983-0 / 9780387739830