Helicopter Ingenuity
From the article by
Gohd (2021), ‘Mars helicopter Ingenuity: First aircraft to fly on Red planet’,
helicopter Ingenuity took off successfully on April 19, 2021. Tucked in NASA’s
Perseverance Rover’s belly, it was NASA’s first aircraft to be launched to the
Red Planet on February 18, 2021, as part of NASA’s Mars 2020 mission. Some of
helicopter Ingenuity's features are solar panels, batteries, rotor blades, and
cameras. According to Gohd (2021), the helicopter's solar panel charges
Lithium-ion batteries that provide enough energy for one 90-second flight per
Martian day. Gohd (2021) also mentioned Ingenuity to have two cameras on board,
one with 0.3-megapixel black-and-white camera that points down to the ground,
used for navigation. The other camera is a 12-megapixel high-resolution that
looks out to the horizon. As mentioned in the article, the helicopter has rotor
blades of just under 1.2 meters across, powered by a small solar panel mounted
above its rotor blades.
Although helicopter
Ingenuity currently is not a transportation device, it proved that flight on
another planet is possible using its rotor blades and navigated around Mars
using its 3D imaging system.
Helicopter Ingenuity
was able to succeed in its mission to prove that powered flight is possible on
Mars with the use of powerful rotor blades. According to Iles (2021), it was
mentioned that the rotor must spin at a speed that creates a lift force. To
achieve this, the carbon fibre rotors spin at a high speed of 2,400 revolutions
per minute. Ingenuity’s blades are 1.2m from tip to tip while its body is
merely the size of a tissue box as mentioned by Iles (2021). According to
Potter (2021), Mars’ atmosphere is very thin compared to Earth where Mars has
an atmospheric volume of less than 1% that of Earth’s. There are other challenges
in flying a helicopter on Mars which included wind and dust storms and making
sure that the craft has enough power from its solar array as mentioned by Gohd
(2021). Therefore, despite the harsh weather conditions on Mars, the fact that
Ingenuity was successfully able to fly 3 metres above the surface lasting for
40 seconds according to Gohd (2021) on its first try is remarkable.
Moreover, using its 3D
imaging system, helicopter Ingenuity can autonomously navigate around Mars. With
the use of the cameras and sensors on its body, Ingenuity can detect the
surface below it and map a 3D reconstruction of it that allows it to determine
the suitable landing spots as mentioned by Brockers (2021). According to
Brockers (2021), it was mentioned that due to the distance between Earth and
Mars, manual control of the helicopter is not possible for take-off and
landing. Therefore, the team had to include this 3D imaging system that allowed
Ingenuity to perform its flights and landing autonomously. With this novel
system, Ingenuity would be able to revolutionize space exploration and access
regions where it is difficult to travel with the use of rovers.
Nonetheless, helicopter
Ingenuity is not a fully-fledged transportation device. This is because it has
very little additional technology as mentioned by Gohd (2021). Another reason according
to Potter (2020) is that Ingenuity was only intended as a technology
demonstration. However, according to NASA (n.d), it was mentioned that NASA
hopes to increase Ingenuity’s usage to use it as a transportation device where
it could assist any astronauts working on that planet.
Regardless of being a
relatively small and minute demonstration, Ingenuity was able to break the
boundary of surface travel on Mars. Thus, helicopter Ingenuity would be the
first step into easier space and planet explorations and be a device that
scientists hope would be a good assist to astronauts.
Amos,
J. (2021, April 19). NASA successfully flies small helicopter on Mars.
BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-56799755.
Brockers,
R. (2021, June), Autonomous Safe Landing Site Detection for a Future Mars
Science Helicopter. IEEE Xplore.
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org.singaporetech.remotexs.co/abstract/document/9438289.
Gohd,
C. (2021, May 22). Mars helicopter ingenuity: First aircraft to fly on
Red Planet. Space.com. https://www.space.com/ingenuity-mars-helicopter-perseverance-rover.
Iles,
G. (2021, June 4). So a helicopter flew on Mars for the first time. A space
physicist explains why that's such a big deal. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/so-a-helicopter-flew-on-mars-for-the-first-time-a-space-physicist-explains-why-thats-such-a-big-deal-159334.
NASA.
(n.d.). Mars helicopter. NASA. https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter/#Overview.
Potter,
N. (2021, July), A Mars helicopter preps for launch: The first drone to fly
on another planet will hitch a ride on NASA's Perseverance rover – [NEWS]. IEEE
Spectrum, 57(7), 06-07 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9126096.