Mars-back Approach to Moon-Mars Exploration System Commonality
Date
2005-11-09Author
Wooster, Paul D.
Hofstetter, Wilfried
Crawley, Edward F.
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
The Mars-back approach entails the development of a common system for the exploration
of Moon and Mars by first looking at the requirements placed upon the system by the
Mars exploration case and then projecting the system capabilities back to the Moon. By
developing a common system for the exploration of both destinations, overall
development cost is decreased and any gap between Moon and Mars is either eliminated
or significantly reduced. As elements needed for lunar exploration are a sub-set of those
utilized in Mars exploration, lunar exploration directly demonstrates and validates the
elements prior to Mars exploration and lunar exploration can continue during the
exploration of Mars. Through directly linking lunar exploration to the exploration of
Mars, Mars exploration can be significantly accelerated and greater public support can be
maintained in order to sustain the Vision for Space Exploration. In designing elements for
a common Moon-Mars exploration system, our analysis indicates that through proper
upfront systems engineering and appropriate use of platforming and modularity, the
performance overheads associated with each particular use case can be kept low while the
affordability of the overall system can be significantly improved.