NASA orders experimental new spacecraft inspired by stingray to explore Venus
NASA launches an experimental new stingray-inspired spaceship that would make it easier to explore the volatile surface of Venus
- University of Buffalo has sold NASA with a bold new design for a spacecraft
- Researchers based their design on a stingray, with flexible wings
- Code name BREEZE, the ship is tuned to the dense and warm atmosphere of Venus
Today, the University of Buffalo has announced that NASA has accepted its proposal for an experimental spacecraft that could navigate through the notoriously inhospitable Venus.
Developed in the Crashworthiness of the University for Space Structures and Hybrids Lab (CRASH Lab), the vessel was modeled after a stingray, with flexible chest wings that can maintain speed and stability in the thick atmosphere of Venus.
The vessel, called Bio-inspired Ray for extreme environments and zonal exploration or BREEZE, would be powered by solar panels that charge every two to three days when the vessel emerged from the dark side of the planet.
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Researchers from the University of Buffalo have modeled their new spaceship on stingrays, with dynamic breast wings that will help it navigate through the thick and volatile atmosphere of Venus
"By taking our signals from nature, especially sea jets, we want to maximize flight efficiency," said Javid Bayandor of CRASH Labs in a statement.
"The design will allow an unreachable degree of control for such a spaceship that would be subject to severe zonal and meridional winds on the planet."
The atmosphere on Venus consists almost entirely of carbon dioxide and is filled with thick clouds of sulfuric acid.
It scores as the closest in the solar system, 93 times denser than the Earth's atmosphere.
Venus is also the hottest planet in the solar system despite being farther away from the sun than Mercury.
Venus is not the closed planet for the sun, but it is the hottest thanks to the dense atmosphere filled with carbon dioxide and sulfuric acid clouds
The thick atmosphere of Venus retains heat and maintains an average surface temperature of about 864 ° F (or 462 ° C), hot enough to melt lead, tin and zinc.
The pressure on the surface of the planet is the equivalent of 3000 feet under water.
The CRASH Labs project was part of NASA's Innovative Advances Concepts program, which grants grants of $ 125,000 to space technology concepts that the agency believes have radical potential.
In September, representatives of the Venus Exploration Analysis Group from NASA pitted the agency to make missions to the planet a new priority.
The atmospheric pressure on the surface of Venus is the equivalent of standing under 3000 feet of water on Earth
It has been 25 years since NASA last sent a spaceship to Venus for something other than a flyby.
Scientists would like to know more about the planet, which they believe has had many fundamental similarities with the earth in the early history of the solar system.
More information about what has changed Venus so dramatically can provide new insights into how and why life on earth has evolved.
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