UAV mission design for the exploration of Mars - ESA/EUROAVIA Design Workshop 2006

Abstract

This paper describes three different mission concepts for the exploration of Mars by means of a UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle). These concepts have been proposed after a three week workshop held by the European Association of Aerospace Engineers EUROAVIA and the European Space Agency ESA. The UAV designs have been a combined effort of a total of 30 European engineering students. The students had to transfer broad ESA requirements into a mission statement, specific requirements and a clear scientific mission goal. All three designs will be addressed in this paper up to a subsystems level detail. In addition, the design implications of the Martian environment, specifically on UAV design, will be addressed.