It begins its scientific missions to provide an integrated picture of the atmosphere of the red planet
"Probe of Hope" is the third global mission to enter Mars orbit from the first attempt
Al-Amiri and Sharaf during a press conference the day after the probe reached the capture orbit.
From the source
Sarah Al-Amiri: "Sharing data with the global scientific community, starting next September, is free of charge."
Imran Sharaf: "The most difficult stage has passed, and the process is now easier because the probe is in the orbit of Mars."
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The leader of the Emirates Mars Exploration Project "Probe of Hope", Eng. Omran Sharaf, stated that the probe's success in entering the capture orbit around the Red Planet is due to the fact that the probe team has benefited from the experiences of others, and he did not consider the mission a space competition, but rather international cooperation. Until the "Probe of Hope" is the third probe in the world to succeed in the first attempt to overcome this most dangerous stage among the stages of its mission.
The Minister of State for Advanced Technology and Chair of the Board of Directors of the Emirates Space Agency, Sarah Bint Youssef Al-Amiri, said in response to a question to «Emirates Today» about providing the probe with new scientific tasks, that «any probe is designed to operate for a number of years more than the specified time for the scientific mission assigned to implement it. And we put in the mission several questions to get an answer, because we do not have sufficient data about the red planet, and over the course of half a Martian year (an Earth year) we collect data on two seasons of the year on Mars, and during this period a number of questions that we have identified are answered Then, by the end of 2022, the scientific team for the probe can determine the additional data it needs, and accordingly the team designs the additional tasks of the probe.
This came during a press conference held by the Emirates Mars Exploration Project Team, "The Hope Probe", and organized by the UAE Government Media Office at the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center in Al Khawaneej in Dubai, one day after the probe succeeded in reaching the capture orbit around the Red Planet.
Al-Amiri pointed out that these questions will be answered after confirming the state of the probe, knowing the amount of fuel remaining in it, and to which orbit the probe can be diverted to, but all this information cannot be determined at the present time.
She said that preparing the mission to reach Mars and return from it to Earth again requires a system to get out of the red planet's gravity, and that it takes a number of years to reach the appropriate technology for this system at the appropriate cost.
She emphasized that the success of the "Hope Probe" in reaching Mars is the beginning of a series of scientific missions that will provide an integrated picture of the Martian atmosphere for the first time in human history, and put its data at the service of the global scientific community.
Regarding the Emirati cadres that accomplished the Mars mission, Al-Amiri said, the scientific team was developed from Emirati cadres in cooperation with knowledge partners, who worked on distinguished research in outer space focusing mainly on Mars, and they are ready to receive, analyze and provide scientific data within the reach of the global scientific community.
She stated that the engineering team in the project designed an innovative reverse propulsion system that worked for 27 continuous minutes, confirming that the experiences of Emirati cadres in the space sector were crystallized by the Mars exploration project, noting that the next stages of the "Hope Probe" mission will provide the global scientific community with comprehensive data on the cover. The atmosphere of the red planet and the causes of its climate change.
Al-Amiri pointed out that the Emirates Mars Exploration Project will share the most important scientific information and data that it receives with scientific and research institutions around the world, in line with its strategy aimed at strengthening international cooperation and strategic partnerships in the space exploration sector and the science and technology associated with it for the sake of the human future.
She drew attention to the importance of the thermal system developed by the engineers of the "Hope Probe" to adapt to the changing thermal environments throughout its journey in space, in addition to the development of advanced scientific devices on board the probe, which all constituted new qualitative innovations, praising the efficiency of the strategic team that contributed to expanding the scientific and knowledge impact. The UAE project to explore Mars, and to reach the largest possible segment of interested people locally and internationally.
Regarding the data that the probe will collect, Al-Amiri said that the data will be shared with the global scientific community, starting next September, without charge, in order to enhance human knowledge.
On the importance of the mission to the Emirati scientific community, she explained that local universities will benefit from Mars exploration to enable more young Emirati competencies in the space sectors.
Al-Amiri stated that the next step is to develop a competitive space sector in the country, in a way that contributes to achieving a diversified economy based on knowledge, innovation and advanced technology, stressing that most of the MISBAR team members are Emirati cadres and graduates of UAE universities.
For his part, Eng. Omran Sharaf, in response to a question to "Emirates Today", said that the arrival of the probe to the Red Planet and its successful entry into the orbit of the capture around the planet does not mean that the risks and challenges of the mission have ended, as the risks still exist, explaining that the stage of entering orbit Capture that ended the day before yesterday, is the most difficult and dangerous carryover.
He added, "The probe will face several dangers, including rays in outer space, as they affect its systems, so we developed it to reduce the effect of rays on the devices."
Sharaf mentioned that the process of moving the probe from the capture orbit to the scientific orbit needs to be reoriented, and what facilitates this process is that the probe is currently inside the red planet's gravity, pointing out that the team will not be able to contact the probe for two weeks during the summer period, because the sun is at this time A separator between Earth and Mars, and this interruption is normal for any mission to the planet, and this is an important stage for testing the probe and its equipment again.
He stated that the "Hope Probe" succeeded in entering the orbit of Mars from the first time, and is considered the third in the world to succeed in the mission from the first attempt, due to the approach that the UAE followed in the project, in implementation of the leadership's directives to learn from the experiences of others, and this is not considered a space challenge or A space race, but it is an international cooperation, so that not everything related to the mission is built from nothing, indicating that the 450 people who completed the "Hope Probe", worked as one team, despite the fact that 200 of them are Emiratis, and 150 of them are knowledge transfer partners from the University Colorado, California and Arizona, USA, and 100 people are sub-contractors.
He mentioned that during the design and development process, the team carried out more than 100 reviews of its designs, by independent experts, pointing out that the "Hope Probe" team conducted more than 100,000 simulation experiments during the past two years on the process of entering the probe into orbit around the Red Planet with scenarios and data. Different to make sure of its success.
Sharaf stressed that the UAE did not start from scratch, but started from where others ended, and learned from their experiences, and while some view space missions as a race, the UAE viewed the mission as a scientific cooperation, and cooperated with knowledge partners as one team under one identity, which is the identity of «probe Hope".
He added: "The ground station at the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center follows the movement of the probe first-hand to continue its next tasks, as daily contact with the earth station has been scheduled, which enables the work team to carry out the operations of downloading the chain of command and data of various operations in an orderly manner."
Sharaf confirmed that the advanced scientific devices on board the "Hope Probe" have been programmed to collect various information and data about the layers of the Martian atmosphere, and then send them to the project's scientific team for analysis and study, saying: “All the sub-devices on board the probe have been re-examined and tested before moving. To the scientific stage during which the first contact with the probe will be made.
He said that the strategic goal of the project is to empower Emirati youth and create an environment that stimulates research and development, stressing that the project was a challenge to the project's work team, which was ready for all possibilities.
He explained that the next stage is the transition from the initial orbit to the scientific orbit, which lasts for about two months to ensure the validity of all devices to calibrate the data in them if necessary, followed by modifying the path slightly if it is necessary for the probe to enter its scientific orbit, pointing out that the most difficult stage has passed and the process is now Far easier because the probe is located within the gravitational region of Mars.
He said that the mission of the "Hope Probe" made use of the antennas and laboratories available at the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center and around the world, thus greatly reducing the cost of the project and speeding up its completion in a record time.
The scientific orbit stage
The next stage of the "Hope Probe" journey includes moving from the capture orbit around Mars to a scientific orbit to perform its scientific missions, at an altitude of 1,000 km above the surface of Mars and 49,380 km away from it.
It is necessary for the scientific orbit to be elliptical for the success of the mission, while the duration of one orbit around Mars takes about 40 hours, and the first picture of Mars will be taken through its scientific apparatus, while it is in the orbit of capture.
Comprehensive monitoring
The advanced devices carried by the "Hope Probe" monitor everything related to how the weather of Mars changes throughout the day and between the seasons of the Martian year, in addition to studying the causes of the disappearance of hydrogen and oxygen gases from the upper layer of the atmosphere of Mars, which constitute the basic units for the formation of water molecules, as well as investigating The relationship between the lower and upper layers of the atmosphere, monitoring weather phenomena, such as dust storms, and temperature changes, as well as the diversity of climate patterns according to its varied topography.
- the
scientific team for «probe hope» is
ready to receive and analyze scientific data sent from Mars.
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