A catalogue of potential landing sites for the INTERMARSNET mission

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In the framework of the INTERMARSNET Phase-A Study, work was undertaken to create a new catalogue of potential landing sites on Mars to provide the INTERMARSNET mission with a suitable database consisting of sites satisfying all the specific scientific objectives and requirements and technical constraints of a network mission such as INTERMARSNET. The scientific objectives and requirements derive from network science investigations (seismology, meteorology), which provide results at global and regional scale, and from individual site characterization in terms of geology division, geomorphology, geochemistry, iron and volatile studies, and atmospheric structure, at a local scale. After the scientific requirements were fully addressed, a careful evaluation of the mission constraints arising from technical design and mission analysis requirements was carried out. The constraints considered in the study arose from launch scenario, probe delivery and atmospheric entry, landing site altitude and latitude, site terrain characteristics, data relay orbiter, planetary protection, and from the network configuration requirements for the different mission scenario options. A detailed study of the surface of Mars has revealed a set of 100 potential landing sites, all of them scientifically meaningful and technically feasible. These sites form a catalogue of potential landing sites, allowing to optimize the specific investigations of the martian atmosphere, surface and interior, to be performed by the INTERMARSNET mission. The catalogue has been used as a database for the selection of landing site configurations satisfying the network science requirements. Two options in the mission scenario have been considered in the study, the Single-Probe Carrier (SPC) and the Multi-Probe Carrier (MPC). For each option six landing site configurations, each composed of four landers, a three lander regional network plus one antipodal site, have been selected, that way to fulfil the scientific objectives and to be fully compatible with the targeting and delivery capability of the adopted mission scenario option. Of the six configurations for each option, four are targeted to the Tharsis region and two to the Elysium region. These two regions have been selected to host the regional network because they are the most likely areas on Mars to still undergo tectonic activity. For each option one of the configurations has been selected as the mission baseline. Both baseline configurations, for MPC and SPC, are targeted to the Tharsis region.