Marco Polo Mission: International Collaboration
The Marco Polo mission has been proposed as a collaborative effort between ESA and JAXA in order to define the best possible mission at reasonable cost to ESA and JAXA, high technical readiness level and a maximized scientific return. Participation by NASA may also been envisaged.
Currently, a junior participation has been officially proposed by JAXA, taking benefit from Hayabusa heritage, and consisting of:
- GNC (Guidance, Navigation and Control): engineering supports by providing real data from Hayabusa for navigation training; hardware (e.g. LIDAR); from operations: determination of mass, shape, density, etc.
- Tracking support (e.g. ranging and telemetry)
- Heat shield of the Earth Re-Entry Capsule
- Outcomes of testing of sampling devices
- Science instruments
A junior participation by NASA is also possible:
SALMON (Stand ALone Missions of OpportuNities): hardware and software components