EGU2020-6354
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-6354
EGU General Assembly 2020
© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

ESCAPADE: coordinated multipoint measurements of Mars' near-space plasma environment

Robert Lillis1, Shannon Curry1, Christopher Russell2, Janet Luhmann1, Aroh Barjatya3, Davin Larson1, Ronan Modolo4, Roberto Livi1, Phyllis Whittlesey1, Yuki Harada5, Christopher Fowler1, Shaosui Xu1, David Brain6, Paul Withers7, and Edward Thiemann6
Robert Lillis et al.
  • 1University of California Berkeley, Space Sciences Laboratory, Berkeley, United States of America (rlillis@ssl.berkeley.edu)
  • 2University of California Los Angeles
  • 3Embry Riddle aeronautical University
  • 4LATMOS, Paris
  • 5Kyoto University
  • 6University of Colorado, Boulder
  • 7Boston UniversityDepartment of astronomy

Multi-spacecraft missions after 2000 (Cluster II, THEMIS, Van Allen Probes, and MMS) have revolutionized our understanding of the causes, patterns and variability of a wide array of plasma phenomena in the terrestrial magnetospheric environment. ESCAPADE is a twin-spacecraft Mars mission concept that will similarly revolutionize our understanding of how solar wind momentum and energy flows throughout Mars’ magnetosphere to drive ion and sputtering escape, two processes which have helped shape Mars’ climate evolution over solar system history. 

ESCAPADE will measure magnetic field strength and topology, ion plasma distributions (separated into light and heavy masses), as well as suprathermal electron flows and thermal electron and ion densities, from elliptical, 200 km x 7000 km orbits. ESCAPADE are small spacecraft (<90 kg), traveling to Mars via solar electric propulsion as a rideshare with the Psyche metal-asteroid mission in August 2022, matching Mars’ heliocentric orbit until capture and spiral-down to science orbits. ESCAPADE’s strategically-designed 1-year, 2-part scientific campaign of temporally and spatially-separated multipoint measurements in different parts of Mars’ diverse plasma environment, will allow the cause-and-effect of solar wind control of ion and sputtering escape to be unraveled for the first time. Figure 1 shows ESCAPADE’s orbits within a hybrid simulation of the solar wind interaction with Mars, where the color scale represents ion velocity, blue lines are magnetic field, while white lines are sample proton trajectories and spacecraft orbits.

ESCAPADE has been selected for Phase A and B study by NASA as one of three finalists in the SIMPLEX-II program.  We will report on science goals, engineering and mission design challenges, and provide a status update.

How to cite: Lillis, R., Curry, S., Russell, C., Luhmann, J., Barjatya, A., Larson, D., Modolo, R., Livi, R., Whittlesey, P., Harada, Y., Fowler, C., Xu, S., Brain, D., Withers, P., and Thiemann, E.: ESCAPADE: coordinated multipoint measurements of Mars' near-space plasma environment, EGU General Assembly 2020, Online, 4–8 May 2020, EGU2020-6354, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-6354, 2020.

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