The Plume Chaser mission: Two-spacecraft search for organics on the dwarf planet Ceres

Abstract

We present a mission concept designed at NASA Ames Research Center for a two-probe mission to the dwarf planet Ceres, utilizing a set of small low-cost spacecraft. The primary spacecraft will carry both a mass and an infrared spectrometer to characterize water vapor detected to be emanating from Ceres. Shortly after its arrival a second identical spacecraft will impact Ceres to create an ejecta “plume” timed to enable a rendezvous and sampling by the primary spacecraft. This enables additional subsurface chemistry, volatile content and material characterization, and new science complementary to the Dawn spacecraft, the first to arrive at Ceres. Science requirements, candidate instruments, rendezvous trajectories, spacecraft design and comparison with Dawn science are detailed.